Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela (born 15 February 1955) is the Research Chair in Studies in Historical Trauma and Transformation at Stellenbosch University in South Africa.

Her main interests are traumatic memories in the aftermath of political conflict, post-conflict reconciliation, empathy, forgiveness, psychoanalysis and intersubjectivity.

She experienced the feeling of being a "second-class citizen" in her country of birth most strongly during her first trip to the United States in 1989, when she spent a few months as a research fellow affiliated with the Psychology Department at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

She directed and acted in her first play, A Man for All Seasons, adapted from a book by Robert Bolt based on the story of Sir Thomas More.

In her first year at Fort Hare University, she registered for a BSc degree, taking a combination of courses (called "pre-med" at the time) that would allow her to enter into medical school.

In this period, she gave lectures and started writing on what she referred to as the "new phenomenon" she witnessed while serving on the TRC's Human Rights Violations Committee – forgiveness of the unforgivable.

In her award-winning book, A Human Being Died That Night: A South African Story of Forgiveness, Gobodo-Madikizela argues that the TRC overturns Hannah Arendt's notion of acts that are unforgivable and unpunishable, and for which no apology can be made.

She claims that, at South Africa's TRC, precisely the opposite occurred – apology and forgiveness for what Arendt referred to as "radical evil."

In 2017, Professor Gobodo-Madikizela was appointed to the post of Research Chair in Studies in Historical Trauma and Transformation at Stellenbosch University in the Western Cape.

The first is exploring ways in which the impact of the dehumanising experiences of oppression and violent abuse continues to play out in the next generation in the aftermath of historical trauma.

[6] She currently sits on the International Advisory Board of The Senator George J. Mitchell Institute For Global Peace, Security And Justice at Queen's University Belfast.

She holds the Claude Ake Visiting Chair, which is co-financed by the Nordic Africa Institute and the Department of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University.