Research Paper on "How Nelson Mandela Influence on Apartheid"

Research Paper 9 pages (2937 words) Sources: 6

[EXCERPT] . . . .

macro sociological issue being addressed?

what theory did he or she use?

did the article have a social impact- positive or negative?

what did you learn?

what are suggested if any? do you see them as feasible?

develop a survey that is no more that 10 questions. A. The survey must be administered to at least 40 people. B. The survey results will provide data for your research paper. The questions will address your research question.

Harrell, Willie, J. Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World: A Review Journal

Vol 1 Issue 1 -- January 2009

Found online at http://www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/journals/journal.asp?id=

Nelson Mandela's South Africa

Born to walk in the steps of ancestors past

Across plush fields where once we hunted and gathered

San, Khoi-Khoi, Bantu, giraffe, leopard, and rhino in this vast land

Awaken to the stampede of the Boer invaders

Armed and angry they herded, killed, pushed and preyed

Until finally all are caged, life evolves into a new age

The great South Africa shrinks, the Boer takes the best

Leaving only seven percent to the rest

Borders created within a single land to separate the white and black man

The Boer are European paraders, thieves, and raiders

We are so many, and they so few, yet our songs have changed

Our lives have been rearranged

We want it back, but it is too late

Time has moved on, now Boer descendants to South Africa belong

The white man's laws, his land, his rule

To the black majority is cruel

Seven percent is bursting at the seams

Women and children weep while fathers, brothers, and husbands are beat

Then comes a black man proud and loud

He will face the Boer and talk him down

The Boer fears the man

The world cheers the man

From behind the bars of the Boer's jail

The words of the man across the airwaves sail

Rally the San, Khoi-Koi, Bantu, giraffe, leopard, and rhino too

The majority will no longer their silence keep

Many die under the rallying cry for peace

Awaken to the new dawn in South Africa

The proud man is free to lead

Nelson Mandela's Influence on Apartheid

When we consider the influence any one individual who has brought about significant measurable changes within society as a whole, then that particular individual's social, political, and religious rhetoric becomes tantamount to understanding how he or she was able to effect that social change. Most of us understand how, prior to World War II, Adolf Hitler was able to move from a relatively insignificant political stature to the highest position of power in German society by employing rhetoric that stirred the German peoples' fears, causing them to revive prejudicial myths that gave rise to racist hate mongering of the Jewish people in Germany and throughout Europe. We saw the same power of political, social, and religious rhetoric employed by the American civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whose goal was much more admirable and honorable than that of Adolf Hitler, and while the scale of human destruction by way of genocide was in no way comparable, the segment of American society whose fear and hate King stirred with what Willie J. Harrell, Jr., PhD, has described in referring to Nelson Mandela, as "jeremiadic discourse (Harrell 2009)." In the case of King, that discourse evoked a response among segregationists comparable to the emotional response evoked by Hitler in the German people. Mahatma Gandhi in India, and Nelson Mandela in South Africa did likewise, although Mandela's impact on South African society stands out as a case in point because of the composition of South African society, and in terms of the political hierarchy that existed when Mandela began his long road to racial enfranchisement.

Unlike Hitler, Mandela, King, and Gandhi were attempting to bring about positive social changes that help to close the void, not widen it as was Hitler's intention, between people of different ethnic cultures and race living side by side in society. But Mandela is unique, because he represents the indigenous majority of a country that was disenfranchised by the minority descendants of non-indigenous colonizers whose fear and hate for the majority manifested itself in a politically instituted a system of racial apartheid. Unlike the American and British Indian Governments where King and Gandhi lived, the South African Government was bold enough, or fearful enough, to attempt to silence Mandela's voice by imprisoning him. Instead, they called world-wide attention to the plight of the South African black majority under apartheid, and the world press carried Mandela's message not throughout the shanty towns of South Africa, but beyond, to first world free nations that held themselves out as bastions of freedom, thereby forcing those nations to become involved in Mandela's movement to abolish apartheid in South Africa.

This essay is an examination of Mandela's rhetoric that brought about tremendous social change. The discussion here relies upon an Ethnicity and Race in a Changing World journal article by Willie Harrell, Jr. (2009) in analyzing Mandela's rhetoric.

In order for a man of philosophical vision, one who inspires people on a world-wide scale with rhetoric that is magically moving as to bring about social change for the good of a majority in a country, then we should study closely the man, Nelson Mandela. Equally important, we must re-examine the social impact today to see in what ways people understand and recognize Mandela as the facilitator of incredible social change. In support of that, a random simple survey of forty college students in the United States will serve to measure how Mandela continues to be recognized by college students more than a decade after the final South African laws of apartheid were abolished. Positive social has a positive impact on a large scale, and whether or not we cognizant of that impact, it becomes a part of our daily lives as move through life in what is now emerging as a world community.

Mandela

The way in which Nelson Mandela influenced forty years of legal apartheid, and seventy years of black majority oppression in South Africa, is that as a figure head of the anti-apartheid movement he inspired the black majority in South Africa to retaliate against apartheid by civil disobedience (Downing 2003). Mandela said:

"Apartheid is the embodiment of racialism, repression, and inhumanity of all previous white supremacist regimes. To see the real face of apartheid we must look beneath the veil of constitutional formulas, deceptive phrases and playing with words (Harrell 1 of15)."

What Mandela meant here is that constitutions which on the surface appease a free world because it gives whites the power and privilege to pursue happiness in social and economic life, is not a constitution of freedom when it excludes and has specific language that separates the indigenous black majority the rest of society, and restricts their access by creating boundaries within which they must remain in isolation of the opportunity to improve and pursue the quality of life.

Harrell says that when Mandela was imprisoned by the South African in 1962, there was a void in black majority leadership that was filled by Steve Biko (until Biko was murdered while in police custody in 1977). It is not difficult to disagree with Harrell on this point, because prior to, and even after Mandela's incarceration, Mandela continued to be heard and his inspiration was kept alive by ardent followers of his movement, including Biko. Harrell effectively says when he writes:

"Mandela became an influential jeremiadic writer and speaker for in South Afrrica protest. His motivation rhetoric laid the framework for future anti-apartheid jeremiadic discourse employed by other activists such as Biko (5 of 15)."

Mandela realized the importance of bringing into the anti-apartheid movement the free world, even while countries, like the United States, were in the throngs of racial change. Harrell shows how Mandela did this by calling on the free world, saying:

"The freedom movement is a political home for you too. We call on the international community to isolate the apartheid regime. To lift sanctions now would be to run the risk of aborting the process towards the complete eradication of apartheid (5 of 15)."

These are strong words, moving and inspiring, and the international community, including the United States responded with support for Mandela. When a man like Mandela, seeking to bring about such enormous social change, using language that suggests that he understands the concepts of freedom such that he would have freedom for everyone, then it is difficult for the world to ignore such noble language and to dissent from such appeals as they wield their power in the corridors of places like the United Nations, the White House, or the British Parliament. In conjunction with the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, America addressed its own racial inequities by passing civil rights bills, abolishing segregation, and work-related discrimination.

Articulate and inspiring words from someone who represents a people that has been brutally treated, politically and socially ostracized, have great… READ MORE

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