Woman Zone CT
  • Home
  • About
    • Vision
    • The WZ Team
    • Background
    • Projects >
      • Artscape Womens Humanity Walk
      • The Everywoman Project
      • Women's Walks
  • The Women's Library
  • Book Club
    • About
    • Book Reviews
  • Podcast
  • Blog
  • Contact
WELCOME TO THE WOMAN ZONE BOOK REVIEW PAGE.                   
​This is where members of the WZ Book Club get to share their thoughts on titles seen on the shelves of our Women’s Library. All reviews are unsolicited and only those attending the WZBC may borrow and review books.
The Woman Zone Book Club meets on the 2nd Saturday of every month between 2pm and 4pm at The Women’s Library, ground floor, Artscape.  All are welcome.
​
We welcome your reviews of women-authored books. Send between 200-500 words and cover pic if possible to info@womanzonect.co.za or hipzone@mweb and we will post it here! 

JWARA! Induna's Daughter

12/27/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
Author: Joyce Notemba Piliso-Seroke
Publisher: Tafelberg
Reviewer: Nancy Richards
‘A riveting account of activism, courage and values’ is how former first lady Zanele Mbeki describes Joyce’s book on the cover. Notable is that these two women, both born in the 1930’s, come from a generation in which such attributes were nurtured – and essential.
The book starts with the respective stories of Joyce’s father Hannie Booi or H.B., the induna of the title and a proud member of the Jwara clan, and her mother, primary school teacher 
 Ethel Mvulazana.  These chapters reveal the strong educated and cultural rootstock from which Joyce was born.
She then picks up the story of her early life, growing up in Crown Mines in a home where her father’s bowler hat, ‘worn only on special occasions’, sat conspicuously on top of the umbrella stand’, and where ‘the old-fashioned radiogram was switched on for news, weather reports and church services only’. Aside from herself and her five siblings, her parents fostered many other children, ‘from the Cape and other places’. The pictures she paints of this upbringing is of a caring, educated, conscious and conscientious home.
A pivotal stage in her own education was the move to Healdtown Institution where the school motto was ‘They will rise on wings like eagles.’ The path her life was to take seems to have been clearly marked from the outset. Healdtown was followed by the Methodist Kilnerton school where she passed her matric in 1952, ‘grateful to have had the opportunity to explore and acquire knowledge.’ After a brief interlude at Wits and St Francis College, she finally went on to graduate with a University Education Diploma at Fort Hare – the chapter on this iconic seat of learning is an education in itself – as are the chapters in The Teaching Years section.  
Later, social work took the place of teaching in her heart and with a scholarship from the Institute of Race Relations she went to study further at Swansea University in Wales. But if her early path had been mapped out by parental influence, so to an extent, was her career when her mother insisted she come home following her graduation to take up a job at the YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association) in Durban. She was to soar in this role however, moving on to join the national office in Johannesburg and eventually being elected to the World YWCA Executive Committee.
Lets not forget that all of this was set against the backdrop of crippling apartheid and in a chapter called Uprisings , Detentions and Bannings she describes her arrest in 1976 and an agonizing period of detention in the Women’s Jail – though not without humour. ‘Cecily and I, during lunch, while sipping water from our cups, would indulge in a fantasy of toasting each other with gin and tonic.’
After her release from prison she became vice-president of the World YWCA and her commitment to the organization was long and impressive – but in her view, also richly rewarded: ‘The training I received at the YWCA and my exposure through international visits and participating in World Council Meetings, gave me a deep understanding of advocacy.’ Equally her involvement with many other organisations, like the stokvel group The Be United Women’s Forum, the Maggie Magaba Trust and the Women’s Development Foundation gave her the skills and tools that made her an invaluable  candidate for her later appointments, first to the Independent Electoral Commission,  then the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and finally the Commission for Gender Equality.  Again each  dedicated chapter is a lesson, and a reminder.
By the time you reach the Retirement chapter, it’s hard to believe that one woman could have packed so much into a life. More astonishing still is the detail with which she has remembered it.  In the acknowledgements she salutes Betty Wolpert for hatching the idea of writing a memoir and amongst many others who helped with the memories, Barney Pityana for his Foreword ‘honouring me with his analysis to enhance my stories.’
But Joyce’s stories need no enhancement – they are intimately detailed and entertaining. As a reader you can almost hear her voice relating each anecdote. And to have written them in her 80’s is beyond impressive chronicling as they do, so much of South Africa’s turbulent history with first-hand experience and insight.
If there were a criticism it would be that just as her life was intensely ‘a journey of conscious living’ to quote Zanele Mbeki – the book too is intense and my recommendation would be to allow a little time between each of the seven sections. Don’t be in a hurry because as Pityana says, Joyce Notemba Piliso-Seroke is ‘an encyclopaedia of life, politics and morality…she is among the dwindling generation of luminaries in whose reflected glory we have had the privilege to bask. South Africa is richer for her.’
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Write something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview.

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    November 2018

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • Home
  • About
    • Vision
    • The WZ Team
    • Background
    • Projects >
      • Artscape Womens Humanity Walk
      • The Everywoman Project
      • Women's Walks
  • The Women's Library
  • Book Club
    • About
    • Book Reviews
  • Podcast
  • Blog
  • Contact