African Women Who Fought for Anti-apartheid Activism
7 women in the archive worked for anti-apartheid activism. They came from different countries and different centuries, but each of them saw a wrong that others accepted and set out to change it. Read their stories to see how the same cause looked from very different lives.
7 women in the archive
ModernAlbertina Sisulu
South African anti-apartheid activist and nurse who kept the resistance alive while her husband Walter Sisulu was imprisoned for 26 years alongside Nelson Mandela. She was banned, arrested, and surveilled for decades, and never stopped.
IndependenceAnnie Jiagge
Ghanaian jurist who became the first woman judge in the Commonwealth of Nations and the principal drafter of the 1967 UN declaration that grew into CEDAW, the world's bill of rights for women.
ModernFatima Meer
South African sociologist and anti-apartheid activist who built solidarity between Indian and African South Africans, was banned, detained and firebombed for her defiance, and wrote Nelson Mandela's first authorised biography.
IndependenceJeanne Martin Cissé
Guinean teacher and diplomat who became the first woman ever to preside over the United Nations Security Council, took delivery of 100,000 petitions against apartheid, and served her country from the classroom to the cabinet until a coup swept it all away.
ModernMiriam Makeba
South African singer and activist known as 'Mama Africa' who used music as a weapon against apartheid, addressed the United Nations, and was exiled from her homeland for 31 years.
ContemporaryNkosazana Dlamini-Zuma
South African politician and physician who served as the first woman Chairperson of the African Union Commission, having previously led South Africa's transformation of its healthcare system as Minister of Health.
ModernWinnie Madikizela-Mandela
South African anti-apartheid activist who kept resistance alive inside the country while Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 27 years. Known as the 'Mother of the Nation.'