The Comic Life of Mandela
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In Africa the comic-book format is frequently used as an educational medium because it can reach a wide audience.
The eight-book Madiba Legacy Series is a graphic biography of Nelson Mandela. It recounts his childhood in a small South African village, with stories on how he earned the English name Nelson from a teacher (his Xhosa name was Ralihlahla), and how, after his father died, Mandela was raised by a guardian. The series also explores Mandela's political activism with the African National Congress, his 27-year incarceration on Robben Island, his dramatic release and his triumphant years as president of South Africa.
Published in the mid-2000s by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, the comics were distributed through newspapers and in South African schools, libraries and community centers.
The comic collection is part of Northwestern's Melville J. Herskovits Library of African Studies, which is celebrating its 60th anniversary. The library, home to the largest collection of Africana materials in the United States, includes several items commemorating Mandela's life, such as newsreels and documentaries.
Gwendolyn Carter, a personal friend of Mandela's, became the second director of Northwestern's Program of African Studies in the 1960s. She retired in the 1970s and endowed a fund to support the library's acquisition of South Africa materials. The Herskovits Library contains more than 400,000 volumes and extensive collections of ephemera, maps, posters, videos and photographs.
