About

A Passion to Understand: a passionate view of world events and a desire to understand why.

A Passion to Understand is a blog that focuses on the core areas of apartheid, genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and human rights. It developed out of my own desire to understand events in the world around me, especially as they happened in Rwanda, South Africa and the Balkans. I had the idea that if I could break it down for myself in a way that I understood it then perhaps that information would be useful for other people too. The blog is specifically written as an educational resource for school children, college students and for interested adults.

About Me

My name is Mandy Southgate and I am an accountant living in Kent, England. Once upon a time, I studied Psychology and Sociology at Wits University in Johannesburg before completing my Honours in Psychology at the University of South Africa. My key area of study throughout my degrees was inter-personal violence in South Africa in the early 1990s and I covered this topic across various courses in Politics, Sociology and Social Psychology at post-graduate level.

Life has a habit of getting in the way of ones aspirations and so, at the beginning of the millennium, I moved away from the core area of my studies and into the corporate world of accounting and construction. Despite that distance, I maintained an interest in genocide and apartheid, as well as the Holocaust, war crimes and crimes against humanity. As I continue to read about these topics, I will record my findings in this blog.

I am very interested in hearing from like-minded individuals so please don't hesitate to get in contact with me at Twitter @APassionBlog or email: