Issues of shared humanity and the effects of colonialism in a global social order will take centre stage at the 22nd Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture set for Wits University’s Linder Auditorium in Parktown on Saturday (September 28).

This year’s annual lecture will be delivered by fellow Nobel Prize laureate and celebrated author, Abdulrazak Gurnah.

The Tanzanian-born British novelist and academic, who won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature “for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents”, will deliver the address under the theme “Realising Our Shared Humanity”.

The foundation said this year’s theme sought to reflect the idea and ideals that human beings are all one family and that there should be a deep sense of caring and concern for each other that transcends differences such as race, religion and nationality.

The Nelson Mandela Foundation, through its acting chief executive, Verne Harris, said it was honoured that Gurnah would deliver this year’s lecture.

“It is fitting that the 22nd Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture will be held at Wits, which has hosted a number of the lectures over the years and which is where Mandela studied during the 1940s as the only black student in the School of Law at the time.”

Harris said the foundation could not have chosen a more befitting venue in the Wits Campus as Mandela was a Wits student himself and formed life-changing alliances with fellow Struggle stalwarts on the campus.

“At Wits, Nelson Mandela formed life-changing friendships with activists who fought alongside him against apartheid, defended him in court, and sacrificed their lives for the freedoms that we enjoy today. While Mandela did not complete his law degree at Wits, in 1990 the university awarded him an honorary doctorate. In 2004, the Mandela Institute was established in the Wits School of Law in his honour.

“We are delighted to partner again with an institution which had a long association with Madiba,” Harris said.

Gurnah is a former professor of English at the University of Kent and is a world-renowned figure in literature and academia.

In 2021, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature – becoming the first black writer to receive the prize since 1993, when Toni Morrison won it, and the first writer from Africa since 2003, when South Africa’s JM Coetzee was the recipient.

Gurnah is known for creating work that questions simple narratives and structures. He also explores the aftermath of colonialism and war, as well as reckoning with a past deliberately eclipsed and erased by colonialism.

According to Harris, global politics will continue to be a major issue as the world becomes one due to the effects of globalisation which are currently in play more than ever before.

“We believe that Abdulrazak Gurnah is ideally positioned to speak to the theme for the lecture. In his work he demonstrates very powerfully how the making of shared liberatory futures must, of necessity, reckon with ever-present pasts.”

The newly appointed foundation CEO, Dr Mbongiseni Buthelezi, who is set to replace Harris in the new month, will be this lecture’s moderator.

“I am well acquainted with Professor Gurnah’s works and have been deeply inspired by his exploration of what happens when we ignore our shared humanity. I look forward to engaging him further on this issue at the 22nd Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture,” said Buthelezi.

The Star

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Nobel Prize-winning author to deliver keynote address at 22nd Nelson Mandela Foundation lecture