Prof Izak Johannes van der Merwe, a leading human geographer in the Geography and Environmental Studies Department at Stellenbosch University, passed away earlier this month after losing his battle with cancer.
Van der Merwe was born on 21 March 1941 and completed his matric at Hottentots Holland High School in Somerset West. In 1962, he obtained a BA degree from Stellenbosch University, followed by a BA Honours and a Masters degree, which he attained with cum laude. Ten years after first enrolling at Stellenbosch University (SU), he completed a DPhil, focusing on The differential development of the intra-urban space of Kimberley in his thesis.
He joined the Geography Department as junior lecturer in 1966 and for the next 29 years developed an academic career in that environment that saw him rise to the position of professor and serve as Chair (1991-1996) of this department as well as fulfil the role of Director of the Institute for Cartographic Analysis at SU for 15 years. From 1997 to 2002, he was Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Science and in 2003, joined the Geography Department again, this time as a Research Fellow.
Over the years, his research and teaching has focused on urbanisation and urban problems in Southern Africa, socio-cultural and language patterns, regionalism and boundaries, and higher education change and structures, however, much of his research was linked to spatialising socio-economic change in the greater Cape Town area. As a leading human geographer in the department for most of the 1970s until the mid-1990s, he also made some unique contributions to South African geographical discourse through language and medical geographies. One of his latest contributions was 'an investment strategy for effective town development in the Western Cape' in 2005.
Van der Merwe has published 53 scientific articles in accredited journals in South Africa and abroad and has authored and co-authored a total of 15 books and atlases and 12 research reports. His first book, the 1983 Die Stad en Omgewing (in English, The city and its Environment), became a widely used prescribed textbook for students at Afrikaans-speaking universities in the 1980s and 1990s. It was followed by books like the Social Atlas of the Cape Town Metropolitan area, Atlas for Encyclopaedia of the World, Economic Atlas of South Africa, Language Atlas of South Africa, Language in South Africa: Distribution and change, Stellenbosch University: Origin of students and The Linguistic Atlas of South Africa - Language in space and time. Over the last 10 years before his retirement, he delivered an average of two academic papers per year at national and international conferences as well.
He has held a number of professional positions, amongst them serving as editor of the South African Geographer (1992 - 1993) and as the first President of the newly formed Society of South African Geographers between 1995 and 1997. In the 1980s, Van der Merwe was a member of the editorial committee of the Israeli academic journal Geography Research Forum and a member of the SA Academy of Arts and Science, and in the 1990s was a member of the Development Society for Southern Africa and the Chairman of the Management Board of the Centre for Geographical Analysis at SU. He also served on the 1993 official Task Group of the Negotiation Council on the demarcation of provinces in South Africa which led to the formation of the country's nine post-apartheid provinces, and was a visiting professor at the Institute for Territorial Planning at the University of Ancona in Italy in 1998.
During his illustrious academic career, Van der Merwe was also awarded the Stals Prize from the South African Academy for Science and Arts in 1984 followed by a fellowship from the South African Geographers' Society in 1991. In 2002 he received a C-rating as a researcher from the National Research Foundation.
"He was a great mentor, lecturer and supervisor and inspired thousands of geography graduates to think critically about the urban challenges our cities face,"said Prof Ronnie Donaldson, a former PhD student of Van der Merwe and currently the Chair of the Department.
Van der Merwe leaves behind his wife Audrey Erica Rankin and their two sons, Izak Johannes and Rian.
