Capturing the brilliance of a woman like Miriam Makeba is a difficult feat. She was a woman who fought Apartheid relentlessly and fearlessly with her music, a woman whose voice inspired hope among millions in South Africa and beyond, a woman whose words spoke for so many people that she became known as “Mama Africa.” Makeba’s essence, however, is best encompassed by her own words: “I look at an ant and I see myself: a native South African, endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit.”
When Makeba wrote those words in 1988, Apartheid in South Africa had already been in practice for 40 years and wouldn’t end for another six. The word “Apartheid” means “separateness” in Afrikaans, a Creole language spoken predominantly in South Africa and Namibia. Apartheid was a social and political system that enforced racial discrimination against non-whites in South Africa and present-day Namibia by dividing the population into distinct racial groups and then separating them legally. Black people like Miriam Makeba were not only confined to lives of economic poverty, but also denied basic political rights such as the ability to vote. Black people were forced to live on barren land and attend poorly funded schools. For many of these people, having the strength to fight back against racism, as Makeba did, was rarely a choice; it was necessary for survival.
Makeba’s famed resilience can be traced all the way back to her childhood. The singer was forced to find employment as a child after her father’s death left her financially unstable. By the age of 18, she had already survived an abusive marriage and breast cancer, and had given birth to a child. Enduring these tribulations in the context of the reality of life as a black woman in 1950s South Africa would crush the spirit of most people—but not Makeba.
Makeba once stated that she knew even as a child that “music was a type of magic.” Endowed with as much talent as perseverance, she joined two local bands, The Manhattan Brothers and The Sunbeams. These bands performed mbube, a style of vocal harmony inspired by American jazz, ragtime, Anglican church hymns, and traditional Zulu song. They had a profound effect on Makeba’s career, shaping her musical style and ensuring that her name was known across South Africa.
Makeba’s rapid rise to fame took its biggest leap when she appeared in the 1959 anti-Apartheid docudrama, “Come Back, Africa,” which portrayed the harsh realities of Apartheid to a global audience so accurately that it had to be filmed covertly. The film brought her international attention and she moved to New York City just one year later. Her music became immediately popular in the United States. Though the music she produced initially in the United States wasn’t overtly political, its connection to South Africa helped raise at least some awareness about Apartheid. However, her music and image may also have been misused by Americans to represent the entire continent and people of Africa. After just five years in New York, she won a Grammy Award for her album “An Evening with Belafonte/Makeba.” Free from the threat of imprisonment, Makeba continued to speak out against the South African government and produce music that was more explicitly critical of Apartheid. In 1963, she testified against the system at the United Nations, famously asking world leaders, “Would you not resist if you were allowed no rights in your own country because the color of your skin is different from that of the rulers, and if you were punished for even asking for equality? I appeal to you, and to all the countries of the world to do everything you can to stop the coming tragedy.”
Unsurprisingly, the South African government was not supportive of Makeba’s anti-Apartheid activism. When her mother passed away in 1960, she attempted to return home for the funeral, but was denied entry into the country at the airport. Her citizenship had been terminated. Makeba never got to see her mother’s burial. She was also separated from her daughter, who was still living in South Africa, and would not be allowed to see her homeland for another 30 years.
Makeba’s exile was a tragedy to both her and her fans in South Africa, but it also indicated that she had become a serious threat to the South African government. For the South Africans suffering under Apartheid, her music was not just hope, it was inspiration to resist. In fact, the government banned her music throughout South Africa. Meanwhile, Makeba was experiencing troubles of her own as she adjusted to life in the United States. After her marriage to a leader of the Black Panther Party, Stokely Carmichael, in 1968, she lost support from many of her white fans in the United States. The marriage also resulted in constant CIA and FBI surveillance, which was commonplace among Black Panther Party leaders and their families during the 60s and 70s.
However, as was always the way of Mama Africa, she continued to flourish in the face of adversity. Although her US visa was revoked due to her marriage to Carmichael, she was granted passports by several other countries including Guinea, Algeria, and Belgium. Despite being unable to return to South Africa, she began to perform in other African countries, most notably in support of their independence movements. Her popularity and respect grew so much that she became a diplomat for Ghana and was appointed Guinea's official delegate to the UN in 1975. Her work’s influence also earned her the title, “The Empress of African Song.”
Under immense pressure, the South African government finally allowed Makeba to return in 1990 (only four years before the end of Apartheid). However, the country she returned to had transformed dramatically from the one she had left. Influential leaders like Nelson Mandela were catalyzing change and bringing the country closer to the end of Apartheid, even though there was still much progress to be made. Makeba found joy in this, knowing that her music and activism had played a role in the revolution. However, this South Africa was now a South Africa absent of both her mother and her only child Bongi, who had tragically passed away five years earlier after a miscarriage.
When Mama Africa herself passed away in 2008, the generation that she had empowered and spoken for mourned fondly and exuberantly. Tributes poured from the millions whom she had inspired worldwide. Nelson Mandela, a major figure in the struggle against Apartheid, said, “Her music inspired a powerful sense of hope in all of us.” Makeba passed away shortly after performing at a concert in Italy.
When I first started to really discover Miriam Makeba’s music, she was already gone. Among my generation of Africans, a generation that never personally experienced the struggles for independence, people like Makeba are made known to us only through the stories told by our parents and grandparents. A part of the beauty of music, however, is its timelessness. Makeba’s voice of hope, inspiration, and resilience will forever be immortalized in her songs. Even as she rests, she continues to be the “mother” of millions of Africans like me. My only hope is that my generation will continue to tell her story.
Mommy Issue | December 2019