Nompumelelo ‘Mpume’ Gumede is a PhD Candidate at the Centre for Communication, Media and Society (CCMS) at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Her research interests are in Social and Behaviour Change Communication (SBCC), with a special focus on bottom-up approaches to Health Communication. She has worked extensively in the field of HIV prevention and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) on a range of qualitative studies in more than 10 countries on the African continent.
Her more recent work includes exploring Meaningful Youth Participation (MYP) with Adolescent Girls and Young Women (AGYW) in a youth-led HIV prevention programme in South Africa. She has presented some of her work on MYP and youth leadership in HIV programming at several local and international conferences, including the South African AIDS Conference, Communication for Change Conference in South Africa, Women Deliver Conference in Vancouver, Canada and the Virtual IAS Conference of 2020.
Her Masters dissertation explored a culture-centred approach to Parent-Child Communication on sexuality education in rural and urban contexts in South Africa. Nompumelelo’s current PhD study is part of a broader collaborative study exploring a people’s science to COVID-19 communication in township, rural and informal settlements. Her study locates culture as central to the development of locally-relevant COVID-19 communication, using the Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) approach.
The study aims to contribute to knowledge in the broader field of culture-centred approaches to Risk Communication and Community Engagement (RCCE).