Dark Continent: Obama

Thursday, May 07, 2009

Soweto!

--From the Freedom Charter

Dateline: April 38, 2009

The one thing I really wanted to do in Jo-burg was have a good tour of Soweto. After lots of searching, Ellen found one on the internet, JMT Tours [http://www.jmttours.co.za/index.html]. They are a family-owned business and the tour guide, one of the sons, was very knowledgeable and political. He wanted to make sure that we understood the class differences within Soweto. So, he started at the upper income homes--places you never see in the news about the township.

The highlight was at the Hector Pieterson Memorial and Museum. It is one of the finest museums I've ever seen. Lots of old photos and videos. Just being in the surroundings helped me understand the 1976 uprising. We were very moved.

We asked to be taken by Winnie Mandala's house--felt like a pilgrimage.

These photos are from that last day.

Middle class housing

The Infamous Hostels

The hostels with new replacement houses in background

"Informal" Housing

Houses designed to replace slums

These gold mine dumps dot the Jo-burg landscape:
reminders of the past

Obama/Mandela t-shirts

Hector Pieterson Memorial and Museum

Inside the museum, there's a great photo of a teenager carrying a sign that says:
"No More Uncle Toms"
Then, outside, Uncle Tom's Community Center is part of the memorial

Winnie's well-protected house

Mandela's House

Kids singing Nkosi sikelel' iAfrika
note the hands on their hearts

Saturday, May 02, 2009

Cape Town is Exhausting

Many of my friends suggested that I take time to rest while I'm in Cape Town; but there really isn't time. There's so much to see and so many people to meet.

We were introduced to Florence de Villiers by Mercia and Shirley, whom we had met at the Friday night party of fierce women. Aunty Flori is a truly radical woman who told us stories about her anti-apartheid work. We were so lucky to be in her presence.

Attached to this note is are pictures from the V&A Waterfront--a beautiful tourist attraction-- Aunty Flori and our wonderful hosts, Mercia and Shirley. You'll see that the Obama T- shirts were a big hit! Oh yeah, there's also a photo of a figure who looks strikingly like a mammy doll. I wonder if it has the same connotation.

V&A Waterfront

Is this the South African Mammy?

Mercia, Aunty Flori, and Shirley

Amandla!

Academic Biography

Professor White's first book, Sierra Leone’s Settler Women Traders: Women on the Afro-European Frontier, was winner of the Letitia Brown Memorial Publication Price in 1987. Her book with Iris Berger, Women in Sub-Saharan Africa: Restoring Women to History, has become a standard reference text and has been translated into Japanese. Her most recent book is Dark Continent of Our Bodies: Black Feminism and the Politics of Respectability. She has been named a Fulbright Senior Research Scholar in Sierra Leone and a Mellon Scholar and has received a Kidder-Peabody Grant for research in The Gambia. Her appointments have included chair of the Five College Black Studies Executive Committee and member of the Graduate Faculty of the University of Massachusetts. She has a B.A. from Wheaton College, an M.A. in African history, and a Ph.D. in history from Boston University.

Along with her teaching and scholarly career, she has had a distinguished career in academic administration. At NYU, she was appointed Vice Provost in 2005. She advised the Provost on faculty appointments, tenure, and promotion. She worked closely with the Faculty Senators Council to enhance work-life conditions for faculty. She also spearheaded the university’s efforts to diversify the faculty and has responsibility for the Office of Academic Appointments, the Center for Teaching Excellence, and the Faculty Resource Network, a faculty development consortium of 52 institutions of higher education.

From 1998 to 2005, Professor White was dean of NYU's Gallatin School of Individualized Study, where she greatly increased the school’s visibility and reputation. From 2001-05, she was chair of NYU’s Deans Council. Prior to coming to NYU, she was a professor of history and Black studies at Hampshire College, where she also served as Dean of the School of Social Science and Dean of Faculty. While completing her Ph.D. at Boston University, she was an instructor at the University of Sierra Leone and a research assistant at the Afro-American Studies Center at Boston University.