Schwartz Auditorium, Brandeis University Nobel-Winning Nigerian writer and political activist Wole Soyinka will deliver the inaugural Andrei Sakharov Memorial Lecture titled ⌠Cultural Relativism and Absolute Rights■.The lecture is free and open to the public.
Born in 1934, Soyinka (pronounced Shaw-yin-ka) has forged a literary identity and a unique cosmology that combines Christian ritual and Yoruba mythology. An untiring √ and fiercely tested √ social critic, often called Africa's finest writer, he won the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature for his plays, poems, essays and novels that serve as a record of twentieth-century Africa's political turmoil and its struggle to reconcile tradition with modernization. The Swedish Academy cited him as a writer "who in a wide cultural perspective and with poeti overtones fashions the drama of existence".
Outspoken on behalf of African independence since the mid-60s, Soyinka has been consistently uncompromising in struggling against repressive political regimes. He has also responded with eloquence and courage to violations of human rights in Nigeria during the last thirty years. His first two-month arrest in 1965 was for protesting a rigged election. This was followed by two years of imprisonment for opposing Nigeria▓s 1967 civil war. Never formally charged, he was kept in solitary confinement and denied reading and writing materials. Nevertheless, he managed to keep a prison diary and write poetry, using cigarette packages, toilet paper, and ink of his own manufacture. Published in 1972 The Man Died: Prison Notes of Wole Soyinka contain a poignant "moment of self-definition," when fetters were placed on his legs for the first time: "I defined myself as a being for whom chains are not, as, finally, a human being." This experience was the origin of Soyinka▓s religion of human liberty.
In 1994 Soyinka▓s beliefs caused him to take a stand against Nigeria▓s current authoritarian regime, and he was forced into exile. He is now Woodruff Professor of the Arts at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.
For more information, contact Tatiana Yankelevich at (781)736-4717
LAM Representatives Apti Bisultanov and Zuleikhan Bagalova visit US September 16 - October 4
Bisultanov and Bagalova's visit is sponsored by THE ANDREI SAKHAROV FOUNDATION (USA). Persons interested in contacting and/or meeting with Bisultanov and Bagalova can do so through the Foundation's president: Edward Kline tel: (212)369-1226; fax (212) 722-0557; e-mail ekline@inx.net.
Chechen writer Apti Bisultanov and Chechen actress Zuleikhan Bagalova are scheduled to visit the United States from September 16 through October 4 in order to contact and meet with persons who can assist in the restoration of Chechnya. In particular, they are seeking help with:
- 1. Developing in Chechnya the type of Islamic education and society compatible with democratic values and respect for human rights.
- 2. Reviving and preserving Chechen culture and crafts.
Apti BISULTANOV (born 1959, in Urus-Martan, Chechen-Ingush ASSR) is the author of three volumes of poetry and articles on social and political topics. He has served as editor of Raduga, a magazine for children, was a member of the USSR Writers Union and is currently a member of the Russian PEN Center and president of LAM, an organization established in 1995 in Grozny to restore Chechnya's cultural institutions. Bisultanov is married with three children and lives in Grozny.
Zuleikhan BAGALOVA (born 1945 in exile in Kara-Balta, Kirgiz SSR) is a leading actress of the Chechen theater and an Honored Actress of Russia. She is executive director of LAM. Bagalova is a widow with three children and lives in Grozny.
The CHECHENS, fiercely independent and democratic mountaineers, have apparently lived in their North Caucasus homeland for several thousand years. They are Sunni Muslims, blending mystic Sufi beliefs with their traditional customs and clan-based social structure. For some 200 years they have fought Russian occupation. In 1944 they were deported en masse to Central Asia, and allowed to return to their homeland only in 1957.
The 1994-96 war between Chechens and Russians resulted in more than 50,000 deaths. Persistent low-intensity conflict among armed groups has spread from Chechnya to Dagestan, and could destabilize the whole Caucasus. Approximately 1,000,000 persons live in Chechnya, roughly the size of Connecticut; its future status has not yet been resolved. Detailed information on Chechnya can be found in two books published this year: Anatoly Lieven, Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power, Yale University Press, and Carlotta Gall and Thomas de Waal, Chechnya: Calamity in the Caucasus, New York University Press.
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