​

INVITATION

Women Crush Wednesday at Stellenbosch University

Stellenbosch University Museum, the Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert Institute and the Transformation Office, in partnership with Michigan State University, cordially invite you to participate in a conversation with Tiffany D Caesar, PhD candidate in African American and African Studies at Michigan State University. Her presentation will be entitled Phyllis Ntantala-Jordan: South African Exile in Detroit and the Anti-Apartheid Movement. The conversation will be facilitated by Kholofelo Molangwane, a student at Stellenbosch University.

Date:     15 August 2018

Time:     18:00

Venue:  University Museum, 52 Ryneveld Street, Stellenbosch

RSVP: Natasha Coltman at 021 808 3691 or ncoltman@sun.ac.za

Light refreshments will be served after the conversation.

Phyllis Ntantala-Jordan: South African Exile in Detroit and the Anti-Apartheid Movement

Tiffany D Caesar, PhD candidate in African American and African Studies at Michigan State University, will discuss Phyllis Ntantala-Jordan's life in Detroit. She was introduced to the story of Phyllis in the Mthatha research library at the Nelson Mandela Museum, Eastern Cape. Black activism in Detroit between 1960 and 1980 contributed to creating an environment for South African exiles due to its highly politicised climate and the anti-apartheid sentiment within the black community. The focus of the discussion concerns South African exile Phyllis Ntantala-Jordan, mother, educator, scholar, writer and anti-apartheid activist. Little is written about her experience in Michigan, although she did publish An African tragedy: The black woman under apartheid, in Detroit in 1976 through the black radical press Agascha Production. This historical and cultural discussion serves as an initial bridge linking Mama Phyllis's life in the Transkei with her life in Michigan, particularly Detroit, and providing more context for her political and personal experience there. The talk will also display how the black community and institutions in the United States, like the Black Studies Department at Wayne State University, contributed directly to creating these pan-African environments for South Africans and other African exiles to live, work and, most importantly, protest for their human rights in colonial systems like apartheid. Tiffany is currently looking to publish her work in journals focusing on African culture, black women and activism.

Biography of Tiffany D Caesar

Tiffany D Caesar is a PhD candidate in African American and African Studies, specialising in Urban Education, at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan, in the United States. Her research interests include Africana women in educational leadership in South Africa and the United States, African-centred education, womanism, pan-Africanism and black culture. Additionally, she participates in cultural heritage preservation initiatives in the United States and South Africa. She has collaborated with Michigan State University Museum, Stellenbosch Museum and the Nelson Mandela Museum on educational programming and international partnerships. Tiffany is a Cultural Heritage Fellow for the Ubuntu Museums and Communities Connect Project, which continues to create cultural heritage partnerships between the United States and South Africa. In continued advocacy of black people's equality and civil rights, she has also written a children's book called Where Is Bobby? in response to police brutality in the United States. Forthcoming is her published chapter “African women leaders of African centered education: A portraiture of mothering, pan-Africanism, and nation-building in Africa" in the book New frontiers in the study of the global African diaspora: Between uncharted themes and alternative representation (MSU Press, forthcoming 2018).