Department/Unit: School of Social Sciences/Environmental Studies
PhD Institution: University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
PhD dissertation title: The Tragedy of the Ababirwas: Cattle Herding, Power and the Socio-environmental History of the Ethnic Identity of the Babirwa in Botswana, 1920 to the Present
Current research interests and projects: Research Interests: i. African Environmental History, with special emphasis on more-than-human histories ii. Health, Disease and Medicine in African History iii. Ethnicity and National Identity in Southern Africa Research Projects: i. Environmental History of the Okavango Delta wetlands from the late 19th century to the present ii. The ethnicization of endemic syphilis in colonial Botswana iii. Rural development and the construction of a masculine national identity in post-colonial Botswana
Selected publication 1: Phuthego P. Molosiwa, Maitseo M.M. Bolaane, “A Peaceful Country’: Refugees, Masculinities and Anti-radical National Identity in Early Postcolonial Botswana”, Historia, 66 (2), 2021, 48-73
Selected publication 2: Maitseo M.M. Bolaane, Phuthego P. Molosiwa & Barbara N. Ngwenya, “A Magnificent Sheet of Water”: A Historiography of Lake Ngami Landscape and its Ecosystem Services in the Lower Okavango Delta, Botswana” in Kgathi, et al (eds.), Dynamics of Ecosystem Services and Human Well-being in the Okavango Delta’s Lake Ngami, Botswana: Implications for Sustainability Science and Policy (Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science Publishing, 2018). SBN: 978-1-53613-988-4.
Selected publication 3: Phuthego P. Molosiwa, “The Big Cough!’: Tuberculosis, Popular Perceptions and Beliefs in the Eastern Bechuanaland Protectorate, 1932-1967.” Limina: A Journal of Historical and Cultural Studies, 22 (1) 2016, 1-18
Selected publication 4: Phuthego P. Molosiwa, “A Walking Museum of Clinical Syphilis?’: Gender, Sexuality and Syphilis in the Eastern Bechuanaland Protectorate, 1930s-1950s.” International Journal of African Historical Studies, 49 (3) 2016, 179-194
Selected publication 5: Phuthego P. Molosiwa, “Bakgomong: The Babirwa’s Transboundary Pastoralist Identity and Social Change in Late 19th Century Botswana”, New Contree: Journal of Historical and Human Sciences for Southern Africa, No. 75, July 2016, 14-40
Selected publication 6: Phuthego P. Molosiwa, “Rinderpest and Famine in the Bechuanaland Protectorate: The Case of the Bangwato Reserve”, Contemporary Journal of African Studies, 2(2), 2014, 113-136
Capstone assignment title: Reflections on My First Encounter with PhD Supervision
Capstone assignment abstract: This essay is about how technology mediates transactional distance in doctoral supervision. In early 2019, I got my first opportunity to supervise a doctoral student as co-supervisor. I am not faculty at the university that appointed me co-supervisor and therefore did not take part in the selection of the student. Nor did I sit in the panel that examined and eventually passed the student’s research proposal. The other factor to note is that the University and the student are located in a foreign country, being Zimbabwe, while I am based in Botswana. This transactional distance informs my reflective essay on the transformative journey that is doctoral supervision. As the theory of engagement teaches us, technology mediates transactional distance because it facilitates engagement. At the same time technological mediation of transactional distance does not adequately offset the lack of the human element in the supervision process. For this reason, spatial and temporal distance often presents challenges to the supervision process, especially in terms of building relationships between supervisors and their supervisees.
