Students built the shacks in 1985, when the anti-apartheid movement was sweeping the country, to replicate living conditions for blacks in South Africa under the apartheid regime. The students slept in the tent-like structures in all types of weather conditions, determined to make a point.
Chase Peterson was president of the U at the time, and he remembers the months when the shantytown took over the plaza.
“Some people objected,” he said. “They thought it was messy and dirty and what-not. It bothered them on the way to class. I remember saying, ‘ideas are not tidy … we’re not terribly informed on this matter and as far as I’m concerned, the students were doing a good job.’”
Twenty-eight years later, people across the world are mourning the death of Nelson Mandela, the political activist, peacemaker and first black president of South Africa who helped bring an end to apartheid. Thousands of miles from his home country, his influence is still felt at the U.
Nadja Durbach, professor of history, was born to South African parents who fled their native country because they did not agree with apartheid.
“The insidious thing about apartheid is that [my parents] grew up thinking that it was normal and that was how the world should work,” she said.
After graduating from college, Durbach’s parents had two choices: they could join the resistance as political activists or leave the country.
“They knew they could neither live in that society nor raise children in that society,” Durbach said.
Still, they carried the legacy of South Africa with them, always aware of their separated homeland.
When they returned for a visit to introduce their son to his grandparents, he instantly noticed a type of racial difference he had never seen before. He was exposed to a world where grown black men and women were called boys and girls.
“They knew that they had made the right decision because they didn’t want to raise children who were racist,” Durbach said.
She described the end to apartheid in 1994 as revelatory, having always been very aware of the anti-apartheid boycotts that led up to the end of the regime.
“I had a connection to that place,” she said. “When it came to an end, it was almost unthinkable to me that it had happened. It had been so late … that triumph of Nelson Mandela was heartbreaking and amazing.”
For many South Africans, Mandela was more than a leader.
“Part of Mandela’s charisma is that people really feel like they know him and that they are part of his family,” said Lauren Jarvis, a professor at the U who specializes in South African history. “That is what is so hard about this loss … they feel like they have lost a member of their family.”
Jarvis, who has returned to visit South Africa multiple times over the last 10 years, was there over the summer when Mandela was in the hospital. While media outlets suggested that Mandela’s death could trigger the collapse of a nation, Jarvis was confident that while the loss would be sad, it would not be a threat to the country.
“South Africa is not falling apart,” she said.
While the nation has moved beyond apartheid, it still faces challenges with economic inequality and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The people are evoking Mandela’s legacy through protesting for change.
Unlike many political activists, Mandela was a stalwart beacon for peace.
“He really became a symbol of reconciliation and forgiveness,” Jarvis said.
Durbach reflected on Mandela’s ability to bring people together to change the world in a way that really mattered.
“When I think about his life, I just want to cry,” she said. “It’s just so amazing to me … it could have gone another way if he had been another kind of person.”
Andrew Pace, a recent graduate in history, posted on Facebook shortly after the announcement of Mandela’s death that he was a “personal inspiration.”
“What makes Nelson Mandela such a great inspirational figure to me is his integrity,” Pace told The Daily Utah Chronicle. “It was his ability to lay aside his own personal interest, ambitions, bitterness and anger for the sake of what was right.”
Jarvis and Gary Marquardt, a professor at Westminster College, are holding a candlelight vigil and celebration of Mandela’s life Monday evening at 6 p.m. at Richer Commons, Westminster College. Attendees may bring candles to light in his memory.