Mama Africa!

Mama Africa!

Juvenile herstory
"Miriam sang as soon as she could talk and danced as soon as she
could walk.
She sang folk songs as her mother played the drums.
She sang pop songs for her brother and his friends.
She sang hymns with her sisters in the Sunday school choir.
'Music gets deep down inside me and starts to shake things up'
she said.
And from deep inside Miriam began to shake up the world."
Miriam Makeba, protagonist of Kathryn Erskine's Mama Africa!,
was growing up in hard times. In South Africa apartheid was the law
of the land. Baases (whites) were intent on keeping blacks oppressed
and silenced. They raided their homes and took them away, sometimes
never to return. They arrested those who left their neighborhoods
without passes.
One tragic incident in the book illustrates the cruelty of the
system especially clearly. Miriam and some of her friends were in a
two car collision. Ambulance drivers took only the white passangers
from the other car. One of Miriam's friends was critically injured.
By the time she found help he was dead.
Miriam used her voice to protest the evils of her country and
empower her people. This was risky business. When she left her
country she was not allowed to return--even when her mother was very
sick.
Her songs were reaching people in the outside world, people who
were outraged once they weren't in the dark.
Erskine had a special reason for writing the book. As a white
child she spent several years in South Africa under apartheid. She
and her mother covertly listened to Miriam's music which had been
banned. She attended a segregated school and saw first hand the
cruelties and oppressions inflicted on blacks.
"What inspires me about Miriam Makeba is her resilience, her
refusal to give up, and her unfailing dedication to her people, which
drove her to battle impossible odds. I have often thought: If she
could do it, why can't we all use our voices, our song, to confront
the thinly veiled apartheid of the United States and inhumane
treatment anywhere in the world?"
On a personal note, my daughter, Amber, has made quite an
achievement. She is now officially a PhD candidate!!! She's on the
way to becoming the first woman in the family to have a PhD. My mom
sorta got pregnant. Mea culpa. And I'm just on my masters. She also
earned a leadership award. I am so proud of her!
A great big shout out goes out to the future Dr. Hathaway!!!
jules hathaway


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