My Children! My Africa! (TCG Edition)

Athol Fugard

• Publisher: Theatre Communications Group
• Year: 1993
• ISBN:
  9781559366915
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: African Drama
• Index: Literature

The search for a means to an end to apartheid erupts into conflict between a black township youth and his "old-fashioned" black teacher.

ACT
ONE

SCENE 1

Classroom of the Zolile High School. Mr. M is at a table with Thami and Isabel on either side of him. A lively interschool debate is in progress. Everybody is speaking at the same time.

MR. M: Order please!

ISABEL: I never said anything of the kind.

THAMI : Yes you did. You said that women were more—

MR. M: I call you both to order!

ISABEL: What I said was that women—

THAMI : —were more emotional than men—

ISABEL: Correction! That women were more intuitive than men—

MR. M: Miss Dyson and Mr. Mbikwana! Will you both please—

ISABEL: You are twisting my words and misquoting me.

THAMI : I am not. I am simply asking you—

MR. M: Come to order!

Grabs the school bell and rings it violently. This works. Silence.

I think it is necessary for me to remind all of you exactly what a debate is supposed to be.

(Opens and reads from a little black dictionary that is at hand on the table) My dictionary defines it as follows: “The orderly and regulated discussion of an issue with opposing viewpoints receiving equal time and consideration.”
Shouting down the opposition so that they cannot be heard does not comply with that definition.

Enthusiasm for your cause is most commendable but without personal discipline it is as useless as having a good donkey and a good cart but no harness.

We are now running out of time. I am therefore closing the open section of our debate. No more interruptions from the floor please. We’ll bring our proceedings to a close with a brief, I repeat brief, three minutes at the most, summing up of our arguments.

Starting with the proposers of the motion: Mr. Thami Mbikwana of the Zolile High School, will you please make your concluding statement.

Thami stands up. Wild round of applause from the audience. He is secure and at ease. He is speaking to an audience of schoolmates. His “concluding statement” is outrageous and he knows it and enjoys it.

THAMI: I don’t stand here now and speak to you as your friend and schoolmate. That would lessen the seriousness of my words to you. No! Close your eyes, forget that you know my face and voice, forget that you know anything about Thami Mbikwana. Think of me rather as an oracle, of my words as those of the great ancestors of our traditional African culture, which we turn our back on and desert to our great peril!

The opposition has spoken about sexual exploitation and the need for women’s liberation. Brothers and sisters these are foreign ideas. Do not listen to them. They come from a culture, the so-called Western Civilization, that has meant only misery to Africa and its people. It is the same culture that shipped away thousands of our ancestors as slaves, the same culture that has exploited Africa with the greed of a vulture during the period of Colonialism and the same culture which continues to exploit us in the twentieth century under the disguise of concern for our future.

The opposition has not been able to refute my claim that women cannot do the same jobs as men because they are not the equals of us physically and that a woman’s role in the family, in society is totally different to that of a man’s. These facts taken together reinforce what our fathers, and our grandfathers and our great-grandfathers knew; namely that happiness and prosperity for the tribe and the nation is achieved when education of the little ladies takes these facts into consideration. Would it be right for a woman to go to war while the man sits at the sewing machine? I do not have milk in my breasts to feed the baby while my wife is out digging up roads for the Divisional Council.

Wild laughter.

Brothers and sisters, it is obvious that you feel the same as I do about this most serious matter. I hope that at the end of this debate, your vote will reflect your agreement with me.

Wild applause and whistles.

MR. M: Thank you Mr. Mbikwana.

Thami sits.

And now finally, a last statement from the captain of the visiting team, Miss Isabel Dyson of Camdeboo Girls High.

Polite applause. Isabel stands. She takes on the audience with direct unflinching eye contact. She is determined not to be intimidated.

ISABEL: You have had to listen to a lot of talk this afternoon about traditional values, traditional society, your great ancestors, your glorious past. In spite of what has been implied I want to start off by telling you that I have as much respect and admiration for your history and tradition as anybody else. I believe most strongly that there are values and principles in traditional African society which could be studied with great profit by the Western Civilization so scornfully rejected by the previous speaker. But at the same time, I know, and you know, that Africa no longer lives in that past. For better or for worse it is part now of the twentieth century and all the nations on this continent are struggling very hard to come to terms with that reality. Arguments about sacred traditional values, the traditional way of life et cetera and et cetera, are used by those who would like to hold back Africa’s progress and keep it locked up in the past.

Maybe there was a time in the past when a woman’s life consisted of bearing children and hoeing the fields while men sharpened their spears and sat around waiting for another war to start. But it is a silly argument that relies on that old image of primitive Africa for its strength. It is an argument that insults your intelligence. Times have changed. Sheer brute strength is not the determining factor anymore. You do not need the muscles of a prize fighter when you sit down to operate the computers that control today’s world. The American space program now has women astronauts on board the space shuttles doing the same jobs as men. As for the difference in the emotional and intellectual qualities of men and women, remember that it is a question of difference and not inferiority and that with those differences go strengths which compensate for weaknesses in the opposite sex.

And lastly, a word of warning. The argument against equality for women, in education or any other field, based on alleged “differences” between the two sexes, is an argument that can very easily be used against any other “different” group. It is an argument based on prejudice, not fact. I ask you not to give it your support. Thank you.

She sits. Polite applause.

MR. M: Thank you Miss Dyson. We come now to the vote. But before we do that, a word of caution. We have had a wonderful experience this afternoon. Don’t let it end on a frivolous and irresponsible note. Serious issues have been debated. Vote accordingly. To borrow a phrase from Mr. Mbikwana, forget the faces, remember the words. If you believe that we ...