Recording the voices of struggle

Getting the archive up to full speed is an immense task. An estimated 2 million documents could take as long as seven years to process, Ms. Pandor says. In addition, newly trained South Africans are interviewing more than 200 people, everyone from formerly exiled ANC leaders to current youth activists. Oral history helps fill in the gaps from the 30 years the ANC operated underground.

The vision of a society where rights are not curtailed because of color stretches back to the ANC's founding in 1912, she says. "We need to capture this essence of our former leaders so that young people have a sense of those values."

Adult South Africans should benefit, too, since many of them were poorly educated in the segregated system. "History as we know it ... doesn't tell the true story about us [black people], but there are artifacts and stories being uncovered that paint a different picture," says Meshack Masuku, a South African ceramic artist who went to school only through 4th grade - until, as an adult, he began studying for a bachelor's degree when apartheid was overturned. He now teaches at a formerly whites-only technical school. Both he and Pandor spoke during last week's conference.

Setting the historical record straight can spark important conversations and help reduce the alienation caused by apartheid, says Derrick Swartz, vice chancellor of the University of Ft. Hare, where original ANC documents are being stored. "I would imagine that that will be the most fascinating part of the project - taking it out of the academic milieu into the popular domain," he says. "Then, truly, we will be able to see the power of memory in helping people to navigate their way into the present and the future."

Dr. Swartz says the linkage with UConn is "one of the most significant partnerships that we've developed."

The two schools face some similar challenges, despite extremely different histories. Both want to create a more multicultural campus and make their curriculum more relevant to the 21st century. "UConn is committed to being part of the global

community, to studying and teaching about cultures far removed from our own, and to welcoming people from across the world to be part of our community," President Philip Austin said last year, when the linkages received more than $1 million in grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the United Negro College Fund.

Such efforts take on a special significance as the smoke of Sept. 11 begins to clear. They can help societies "recognize difference as a source of strength," says Nasila Rembe, who teaches human rights at Ft. Hare. Dr. Rembe also holds a UNESCO Chair of Human Rights, one of 53 positions worldwide intended to promote human rights education and networking. At the UConn conference, he announced that Omara-Otunnu has been appointed to the first such chair in the US.

Omara-Otunnu will now have an even wider stage to share his passion for adding the dimension of human faces and voices to the otherwise legalistic realm of human rights. "Quite often, people relate and respond when they see human rights not as abstract ideas, but as ideas that really affect people's lives in very specific, concrete ways," he says. Last year's conference featured adult children of human rights struggles, such as Nkosinathi Biko, who was 6 when his father, Steve Biko, was killed in a South African jail.

The last thing Omara-Otunnu wants is a purely academic endeavor. Indeed, the university partners are a catalyst for potential business ties between Connecticut and South Africa's Eastern Cape Province. "It's going to be a very comprehensive partnership ... and that is the incredible thing," he says.

"It ought to connect people to people - business people, common people, legislators.... Once you have made the link between people, anything is possible."

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