Forgotten heroes deliver a timely lesson on struggle
New book places young lions like Mangaliso Sobukwe at the front of the fight against apartheid and colonialism
The Black Consciousness Reader Baldwin Ndaba, Therese Owen, Masego Panyane, Rabbie Serumula, Janet Smith Jacana The Black Consciousness Reader reads like an ode to the forgotten heroes of SA’s struggle who have been relegated to the footnotes of history despite playing a central role in the fight for emancipation from apartheid rule. The seven-chapter book marks the contribution of several black consciousness leaders, especially its founding father in SA, Steve Bantu Biko. The leitmotif that courses through the text is its demonstration of how black consciousness, its antecedents and exponents of its various strands — most of whom were young activists, some at school and many at university — set the tone for the response to apartheid’s repressive machinery. Today the continent’s political landscape is dominated by septuagenarians who led revolutions past but have not passed on the baton to the youth. Graça Machel, who became Mozambique’s first education minister at independence in h...
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