USA Africa Dialogue Series - Willie Kgositsile

On 1/3/18, 2:24 PM, "Carolyn A. Brown" <cbrown@panix.com> wrote:



Kassahun ( by way of Tiffany),

This is such HORRIBLE news!! I must call Ipeleng, his daughter. Willie is
such an important part of both the U.S. Black poetry movement and that of
South Africa. This, again, is the loss of someone who I thought would be
around forever. I am so glad, though, that he was able to live in a free
South Africa.

I have known Willie since 1968 when he taught at Sarah Lawrence with my
former partner Sam E. Anderson. Our son - Dedan Agaja Anderson and
Willie and Melba's daughter Ipeleng Kgositsele - were born around the same
time and they played together at Sarah Lawrence. I was quite close to
Melba, his former partner, who we loss quite some time ago. But I am in
touch with Ipeleng, who lives in the Bay area as does my son Dedan.
Sam knew Willie from Lincoln University days when he was par of a group
of South African student exiles who joiner joined with activists
(including Tony Montiero of the CPUSA) in digging roots for the
anti-apartheid struggle. Over the years I have been in touch less with
Willie but more intimately, with Ipeleng. He was a very important part of
a crucial and as yet undocumented moment in the New York area in which
African Americans joined with African exiles in bringing the liberation
struggle to Harlem. It is an important part of the history that needs to
be documented as an exceptional period of Pan-African unity.

Please send information re how to reach his family. This is such tragic
news. A generation of progressives is quickly disappearing. I'm copying
this to Sam. Will contact Ipeleng now.


Carolyn Brown

--
Carolyn A. Brown, Ph.D.- Associate Professor
Department of History
Rutgers the State University of New Jersey
Van Dyck Hall - Room 110
16 Seminary Place
New Brunswick, N. J. 08901
(Ph) 732-932-8569/7905
(F) 732 932-6763
http://www.heinemann.com/products/E07006.aspx
http://www.africaworldpressbooks.com/servlet/Detail?no=534
http://www.cambridge.org/us/academic/subjects/history/african-history/africa-and-world-war-ii?format=HB#contentsTabAnchor
++++++++++++++++++++
>
>
> Dear Kassahun,
>
> Gone to take up a new role among the ancestors. I am so sorry for your
> loss and for all of our loss. Natalia Molebatsi (the poet we live with
> here) and Latoya Williams have just gone to his home to be with his
> other friends.
>
> And bless his heart Salim begged to go, not from rational understanding
> but from a desire to keep the company of the light that poets always
> bring to every space.
>
> Thank you for publishing his book.
>
> Circulating the photos of the HR Centre bit by bit with friends on
> whatsapp so folks have a chance to soak it in. Things get so lost on
> Facebook these days.
>
> Regards,
>
> Tiffany
> On 2018-01-03 21:06, Kassahun Checole wrote:
>> Dear friends:
>>
>> I am sorry to share the sad news that our comrade and friend and one
>> of South Africa's great poets, Willie Kgositsile, passed away last
>> night. When I was in Pretoria and Johannesburg for most of December,
>> I could not see him because he was not feeling well. He kept calling
>> me, promising that we will meet soon. I suppose it was not meant to
>> be.
>>
>> I had known him for over 40 years in all the artistic and political
>> struggles in Chicago, New York,London and post-Apartheid South Africa.
>> He will be sorely missed.
>>
>> His book of poetry was published by TWP.
>>
>> Kassahun Checole, Publisher
>> Africa World Press, Inc. &
>> The Red Sea Press, Inc.
>> 541 W. Ingham Avenue, Suite B
>> Trenton, NJ 08638
>> 609-695-3200
>> 609-695-6466 (Fax)
>> kchecole@awprsp.com
>> www.africaworldpressbooks.com [1]
>> facebook.com/africaworldpress [2]
>>
>> Links:
>> ------
>> [1] http://africaworldpressbooks.com/
>> [2] http://facebook.com/africaworldpress
>
> --
> Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, Ph.D.
> Associate Professor
> Department of African American Studies
> University of California, Irvine
> 3224 Humanities Gateway
> Irvine, CA 92697-6850
> Tel: 949-824-7035
> Fax: 949-824-7006
> twilloug@uci.edu
> Managing Editor, The National Political Science Review
>
> Author of Waste of a White Skin: The Carnegie Corporation and the Racial
> Logic of White Vulnerability
> http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520280878
>
> https://uci.academia.edu/TiffanyWilloughbyHerard
>
> --- June Jordan, Poem About My Rights
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUSTxhYu7-4
>
> ---Patricia Smith, Building Nicole’s Mama
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybJARtVIXfA&feature=related
>
>
> ---"Being conscious is knowing that there is little difference between
> those who cannot read and those who will not read."
> Jeorald Pitts. 2010. To Bang or Not To Bang: A Book of Questions.
> Bloomington, IN: Trafford Publishing.61.
>
> ---“…commodification is another form of containment…not all activism
> provides an alternative [to consumption]. Some of it re-inscribes the
> competition, opportunism, disciplinary mechanisms, and demands for
> institutional loyalty that characterize the marketplace. Activism or
> activists, like academia and academics, have their own forms of
> commerce.
>
> At their weakest and most problematic points, they share, in their
> respective sites, careerism, appropriation, and the assertion of
> “authoritative voices.†--Joy James 2003, Academic Activism, and
> Imprisoned Intellectuals, Social Justice 30(2): 3-5.
>
> "Radio is always going to be there...As long as there is poverty, hard
> work and loneliness, radio will be there."---Fernando Schiantarelli,
> manager of KLAX-FM's El Mandril Show with Ricardo Sanchez, from the
> article by Hector Becerra Sept 29, 2013 Los Angeles Times
>
> ---"Reading was, of course, a great help--it stirred, delighted, and
> tormented me." Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground
>
> ---"I'm never surprised that I'm asked to leave. I'm always surprised by
> how long I get to stay... that's my mission on earth to stir shit up,
> make people think, and if necessary to make 'em tear down stuff...It
> ain't been the first time I've been asked to leave, I always find some
> other place to do what I'm doing, and that's teaching"--Baba Tom Porter,
> A Gathering of Warriors: The Struggle for WPFW and Radical Radio,
> Origins of Declaration of Rights for Black Radio December 22, 2013
> http://imixwhatilike.org/2013/12/22/agatheringofwarriors/#comment-18432
>






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