Short description
This collection of lectures brings together the renowned African and African-American scholars - Cornel West, Henry Louis Gates Jr and Wole Soyinka - to reflect on the public meaning of the iconic Nelson Mandela.
Long description
This collection of lectures brings together the renowned African and African-American scholars - Cornel West, Henry Louis Gates Jr and Wole Soyinka - to reflect on the public meaning of the iconic Nelson Mandela. Any one of these authors would have been a pleasure to read in his own right, but to have all three of them enjoined in this common intellectual effort is an enlightening experience. In this title you will find the profound philosophical and political interpretations of Cornel West, the storytelling genius and witticism of Henry Louis Gates Jr, and the wisdom of Africa's grand man of letters and the first person of African descent to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, Wole Soyinka.
Review
Nelson Mandela stands out as a global icon for peace, love, and reconciliation and magnanimity [and] we should understand more the historical forces and social values that shaped and influenced his leadership. --Archbishop Desmond Tutu, from the foreword
Table of contents
- Foreword Archbishop Desmond Mpilo Tutu
- Introduction Xolela Mangcu
- 1 WEB Du Bois, Encyclopedia Africana and Nelson Mandela Henry Louis Gates Jr
- 2 Nelson Mandela: Great exemplar of the grand democratic tradition Cornel West
- 3 Views from a palette of the cultural rainbow Wole Soyinka.