Student Voices
The Centre of Criminology often receives student visitors from all over the World. On this page we will feature their experiences while visiting us.
Here is a letter from Omri Manoach, a Masters student from Erasmus University, Rotterdam who is supervised by Professor René van Swaaningen. His thesis topic is: A Case Study of Employees and their Perceptions of Space in Security Villages. He conducted research for his thesis in Muizenberg near Cape Town.
Omri writes:
My name is Omri Manoach, a 23-year old student from Rotterdam, The Netherlands. I have been visiting the Centre of Criminology at the University of Cape Town for my research for my Master thesis for 4 months in 2009.
When I was making my plans for my visit to South Africa for doing ethnographic fieldwork for my Master-thesis on security villages, I was a bit scared of coming to Cape Town completely on my own. No friends, no guides, absolutely lacking any social ties to and in the Mother City. However, when I decided to contact Prof. Clifford Shearing and Elaine Atkins from the Centre of Criminology at UCT by e-mail my worries disappeared. I was welcomed as if it was my own university and I was given the ability to use the Centre’s facilities for my research. After my arrival in Cape Town I immediately decided to pay the Centre a visit so that my stay in Cape Town would start off with a blast. At the Centre I was introduced to a lot of PhD and Master Students and many of them became good friends of mine. They provided me with a social life, opened up to me and showed me their homes, their favourite hangouts, clubs and bars!
But, I was not only getting a social life in Cape Town. On various occasions some of the academics at the Centre where so kind to help me out with their expertise in informal conversations and meetings I had with them. Over a cup of coffee they provided me with the necessary knowledge and information to carry out my research and assisted me being able to put my research into a South African as well as a fresh academic perspective.
As my research progressed and my social life in Cape Town expanded, I realised that it was almost time for me to head back home and leave behind what I had build up in the past months! However, I have got a strong feeling that this goodbye is not a farewell. The people I have met at the Centre may be out of my sight, but they will have a place in my hearth forever. It may sound very corny, but I am extremely thankful for their kindness, their openness and their insights. Thank you, guys!
If you are a Criminology student from abroad or if your field of interest is Criminology and you are planning an academic visit to Cape Town, then make sure that you visit the Centre of Criminology!
Omri Manoach