Inyathi Ibuzwa Kwabaphambili

Book excerpt: This book seeks to create a systematic, eclectic, historical picture of the present and past women intellectuals, activists, artists, and cultural custodians. Using the concept of ‘ukufukama’ (incubate) we connect intergenerational knowledge transfer of our elders to the current struggles faced by the younger generation of women. We bring together different authors who engage the biographical and intellectual contributions of different African women and their imagination of the democratic South Africa. Writing about the various feminist intellectual traditions between the 19th and 21st centuries, this book systematically pulls together oral and creative texts to recover the memories of Nosuthu Jotelo, Sarah Baartman, Nontsizi Mgqwetho, Phyllis Ntantala, Brigalia Bam, Umntwana uMagogo, Miriam Makeba, Sibongile Khumalo, Lebo Mathosa, Thandiswa Mazwai, Celeste Ntuli, Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, Neo Mathabe among the lives and works covered here. This range of voices shows that intellectual work is varied and has the ability to sit alongside each other. It importantly shows that scholarship emerges through community and conversation, which is to say feminist histories are created and recreated through conversations that care about women’s voices, stories, and being in the world. Ultimately, we think of the women featured in this book as forming a lineage, a tradition of black women’s’ survival wisdom, which facilitated change and enduring, radical transformation that demands theorisation and celebration.