Noni jabavu biography of barack

Victoria J. Collis-Buthelezi asks Athambile Masola and Makhosazana Xaba about their book Noni Jabavu: A Stranger at Home.

They reflect on when they first encountered Noni’s writing, her life and her family, the origins of the phrase “I write what I like”, the difference between living abroad and exile, Black women travelling, transnational archives and the challenges of biographical research.

Victoria J. Collis-Buthelezi is an Associate Professor in English, and Director of the University of Johannesburg’s Centre for the Study of Race, Gender and Class.

Athambile Masola is a writer, researcher and an award-winning poet based in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Cape Town.

Makhosazana Xaba is an award-winning multi-genre anthologist, short story writer and poet. She is an Associate Professor of Practice at the Centre for Race, Gender and Class based at the University of Johannesburg.

Athambile and Makhosazana collaborated on a collection of Noni Jabavu's Daily Dispatch columns from 1977, A Stranger at Home (Tafelberg, 2023).

Our participants also warmly remember Prof Bhekizizwe Peterson (1961-2021), a professor of African literature at Wits University and co-editor (along with Makhosazana and Khwezi Mkhize) of Foundational African Writers: Peter Abrahams, Noni Jabavu, Sibusiso Nyembezi and Es’kia Mphahlele (Wits University Press, 2022).

In this episode we are in solidarity Andrzej Poczobut, imprisoned in Belarus. You can read more about his case here: https://www.pen-international.org/news/belarus-free-writer-and-journalist-andrzej-poczobut

As tributes, Athambile reads from Mongane Wally Serote’s “Third World Express”, Makhosazana reads Lindiwe Mabuza’s “Voices that Lead” and Victoria reads an extract from Beah Richards’s “A Black Woman Speaks … Of White Womanhood, of White Supremacy, of Peace”.

This is the final episode of the season. We’ll be back with season eight after a short break.

This

South African educationist and politician (1885–1959)

Davidson Don Tengo Jabavu (20 October 1885 – 3 August 1959) was a Xhosa educationist and politician, and a founder of the All African Convention (AAC), which sought to unite all non-European opposition to the segregationist measure of the South African government. He was the eldest son of political activist and pioneering newspaper editor John Tengo Jabavu, and the father of Noni Jabavu, one of the first African female writers and journalists.

Biography

Davidson Don Tengo Jabavu was born in King Williams Town, in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, and was educated at Morija Institution, a mission centre in Basutoland (present-day Lesotho). He later studied at Lovedale in the Cape Province before going to the United Kingdom, where he completed his matriculation at Colwyn Bay in Wales. In 1906 he entered the University of London, earning a BA degree in English six years later. As a student he attended the 1911 Universal Races Congress held in London, where he met leading African Americans and Africans, including his father, who was a member of the South African delegation.

Before returning home in 1915, D. D. T. Jabavu visited the United States on a tour of Booker T. Washington's Tuskegee Institute and other black centres of learning. Back in South Africa, he was a founding member of the staff of the University of Fort Hare in 1916, and the first and only African academic at the institution, where he remained as professor of African languages until 1944.

In addition, he established the South African Native Farmers' Association to encourage the development of better farming standards, stressing the value of manual labour. He also founded the Cape African Teachers' Association and the South African Native Teachers' Federation, which he led for many years. He was also president of the Cape Native Vote

Image credits: Athambile Masola by Nonzuzo Gxekwa

Victoria J. Collis-Buthelezi asks Athambile Masola and Makhosazana Xaba about their book Noni Jabavu: A Stranger at Home.

They reflect on when they first encountered Noni’s writing, her life and her family, the origins of the phrase “I write what I like”, the difference between living abroad and exile, Black women travelling, transnational archives and the challenges of biographical research.

Victoria J. Collis-Buthelezi is an Associate Professor in English, and Director of the University of Johannesburg’s Centre for the Study of Race, Gender and Class. 

Athambile Masola is a writer, researcher and an award-winning poet based in the Department of Historical Studies at the University of Cape Town. 

Makhosazana Xaba is an award-winning multi-genre anthologist, short story writer and poet. She is an Associate Professor of Practice at the Centre for Race, Gender and Class based at the University of Johannesburg. 

Athambile and Makhosazana collaborated on a collection of Noni Jabavu’s Daily Dispatch columns from 1977, A Stranger at Home (Tafelberg, 2023).

Our participants also warmly remember Prof Bhekizizwe Peterson (1961-2021), a professor of African literature at Wits University and co-editor (along with Makhosazana and Khwezi Mkhize) of Foundational African Writers: Peter Abrahams, Noni Jabavu, Sibusiso Nyembezi and Es’kia Mphahlele (Wits University Press, 2022).

In this episode we are in solidarity Andrzej Poczobut, imprisoned in Belarus. You can read more about his case here.

As tributes, Athambile reads from Mongane Wally Serote’s “Third World Express”, Makhosazana reads Lindiwe Mabuza’s “Voices that Lead” and Victoria reads an extract from Beah Richards’s “A Black Woman Speaks … Of White Womanhood, of White Supremacy, of Peace”.

This is the final episode of the season. We’ll be back with season