Vinie Burrows, Kassahun Checole,
Imani Countess, Jennifer Davis, Kenyon Farrow,
Silvia Federici & George Caffentzis, Haymarket Books,
Jean & George Houser, Chaz Maviyane, Liz Mestres,
Matt Meyer & Meg Starr, Sonia Sanchez,
Bill Sutherland & Marilyn Meyer
Invite You to Attend the
War Resisters League’s
44th Annual
Peace Award
Stubborn Hope:
Celebrating the Ongoing Struggles for Justice and Peace in Southern Africa
Honoring the Work of
Dennis Brutus,
Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), and
Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe(GALZ)
September 18, 2009 · 6:30 pm
Judson Memorial Church
55 Washington Square South · New York City
The Evening
WRL wishes to honor the work of Dennis Brutus, WOZA, and GALZ both by hearing about their vital campaigns and activities and sharing food and conversation, as we further weave our movements and celebrate our victories. We will enjoy an African dinner at 6:30, followed by a program and award ceremony at 8:00 including poetry by Fungai Maboreke and Mahina Movement, Shona music of Zimbabwe by Mbira New York and songs by member of the Freedom Singers Matt Jones and readings by actor Vinie Burrows.
We will also give the Grace Paley Lifetime Achievement Award to WW II conscientious objector, longtime WRL member and Pan Africanist leader Bill Sutherland.
As anti-apartheid freedom fighter Dennis Brutus sat in his prison cell on South Africa’s notorious Robben Island, he penned the poem “Stubborn Hope” as a way of broadcasting to the world that the struggle would go on, even from behind bars. In the very same cage that had housed Mohandas Gandhi, with colleague Nelson Mandela sharing an adjacent room, Brutus pledged his life to resistance and poetry and has been combining both ever since. The War Resisters League is pleased to bestow our annual Peace Award to Dennis Brutus and two grassroots organizations based in the Southern African country of Zimbabwe—all demonstrating with stubborn hope the idea that lasting liberation and peace will come for all people.
The Awardees
Dennis Brutus was an anti-apartheid activist from within South Africa beginning in the 1960s and played a leading role in the international sports boycott that led to South Africa’s ban from the Olympic Games. An award-winning author, he fled the country after serving a jail term for his political activity and was eventually granted political refugee status in the United States, where he worked as professor of Africana Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. A champion of many causes, he most recently has been an outspoken campaigner against neoliberalism and globalization, teaching at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Center for Civil Society.
Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) was founded in 2003 to provide women from all walks of life with a united voice to speak out on issues affecting their day-to-day lives. Empowering female leadership and community involvement in pressing for solutions to the political and economic crisis currently facing Zimbabwe, WOZA has called for “tough love” based on the principles of strategic nonviolence. With a national membership of over 70,000 women and men, WOZA has defined tough love as a “people power” tool that “any community can use to press for better governance and social justice.”
Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ) was formed in 1990 to provide gay men and lesbians in Zimbabwe with a network to facilitate communication within the gay community. Gaining international attention some years later when the government of Robert Mugabe banned the group from a prominent Pan African book fair, GALZ has always emphasized the importance of understanding that “sexual rights are human rights.” Working closely with other human rights organizations, the women’s movement, AIDS initiatives, and regional associates, GALZ is working around integrating gay rights with the other basic human rights for which Zimbabwean civil society is currently battling. GALZ members edited the book Unspoken Facts: A History of Homosexualities in Africa; GALZ also serves on the Council of War Resisters’ International.
The WRL Peace Award
Intended to honor an organization or person whose work represents WRL’s radical nonviolent platform of action, the award was first given in 1958 to Jeannette Rankin, the only congressperson to vote against U.S. entry into both world wars. Subsequent awardees have included civil rights activists Bayard Rustin and Bob Moses, political folksinger Odetta, poet-priest Daniel Berrigan, military resisters from both Gulf wars, and Fernando Suarez del Solar of Military Families Speak Out, along with groups like Vietnam Veterans Against the War and the Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques. Speakers at Peace Award events have included Nobel laureates Martin Luther King Jr. and Pearl S. Buck, poet Allen Ginsberg, and labor organizer A. Philip Randolph.
