A00044 - William Montague Cobb (Amherst College Class of 1925), First African American Anthropology PhD and First African American NAACP President

 88888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

William Montague Cobb (1904–1990) was an American board-certified physician and a physical anthropologist.^[1] As the first African-American Ph.D in anthropology, and the only one until after the Korean War,^[2] his main focus in the anthropological discipline was studying the idea of race and its negative impact on communities of color. He was also the first African-American President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.^[3] His career both as a physician and a professor at Howard University was dedicated to the advancement of African-American researchers and he was heavily involved in civil rights activism.^[4] Cobb wrote prolifically and contributed both popular and scholarly articles during the course of his career. His work has been noted as a significant contribution to the development of the sub-discipline of biocultural anthropology during the first half of the 20th century.^[5] Cobb was also an accomplished educator and taught over 5000 students in the social and health sciences during his lifetime.^[6]

Early and personal life

[edit]

Cobb was born on October 12, 1904, in Washington DC. His mother, Alexizne Montague Cobb, grew up in Massachusetts and was partly of Native American descent. His father, William Elmer Cobb, grew up in Selma, Alabama. His parents met in Washington DC when his father started his own printing business for the African-American community.

The tipping point for Cobb's initial interest in anthropology came from a book of the animal kingdom that his grandfather owned. In this book, there were illustrations of human beings separated by race, but were illustrated with what Cobb called "equal dignity." This led to an interest in the concept of race, as the same type of "equal dignity" was not granted in the society that surrounded Cobb's life.^[2]

Cobb attended Dunbar High School, a highly esteemed Washington, DC. African-American high school in 1917.^[4] He was a successful student and athlete, and went on to win championships in cross-country as well as lightweight and welterweight boxing during his high school and collegiate years.^[6] He married Hilda B. Smith, Ruth Smith Lloyd's sister, and they had two children.^[7][8] Cobb died of pneumonia on November 20, 1990, at the age of 86.^[4]

Education

[edit]

Following his graduation from Dunbar High School in 1921, Cobb earned his Bachelor of Arts from Amherst College in 1925. Following completion of his baccalaureate degree, he received a Blodgett Scholarship for proficiency in biology which allowed him to pursue research in embryology at Woods Hole Marine Biology Laboratory.^[4] He earned his MD (Doctor of Medicine) in 1929 from the Howard University Medical School. He worked jobs throughout his time in medical school.^[1] Cobb then accepted a position at Howard University which he was offered prior to his graduation.^[4] Numa P. G. Adams, who was the Dean of Howard University at the time, was assigned the task of organizing a new faculty of African-American physicians to help advance the school in the medical field. Cobb, in turn had the aspirations of creating a laboratory of anatomy and physical anthropology at Howard University that would have the resources for African-American scholars to contribute to debates in racial biology. As a part of Dean Adams' efforts, Cobb was sent to study under biological anthropologist T. Wingate Todd at Case Western Reserve University.^[2] Cobb's dissertation work was an expansive survey of the Hamann-Todd Skeletal Collection, a large skeletal population now housed at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History which is associated with Case Western Reserve University.^[4] He earned his Ph.D in Anthropology in 1932 and his dissertation was published under the title Human Archives the following year.^[4]

Career

[edit]

Following the conferral of his doctorate, Cobb remained at Case Western Reserve University as a fellow, where he continued work on the Hamman-Todd Collection with a focus on cranial suture closure. His 1940 publication "Cranio-Facial Union in Man" produced as a result of this work established his expertise as a functional anatomist and is one of his most widely cited works to date.^[5] During this period, Cobb also worked with physical anthropologist Aleš Hrdlička on a survey of the skeletal collection at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.^[4] He returned to the Howard University Medical School in 1930 where he taught for the majority of his career and established the W. Montague Cobb Skeletal Collection.^[6] He became the university's first distinguished professor in 1969 and became professor emeritus in 1973.^[4] In addition to his work at Howard, Cobb also taught at Stanford University, the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, the University of Washington, the University of Maryland, West Virginia University, Harvard Medical School, the Medical College of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, and the Catholic University of America during his lifetime.^[6]

Cobb was heavily involved with a number of anthropological and medical organizations during his career. He was an active member of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists since its second meeting in 1930 and served on its board on multiple occasions, both as its vice president (1948–50 and 1954–56) and president (1957–59). He also held leadership roles with the Anthropological Society of Washington, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Eugenics Society, and the Medico-Chirurgical Society of the District of Columbia. He also served as chairman on the Council of Medical Education and Hospitals for two terms (1948–63).^[4]

Throughout his lifetime Cobb pursued work aimed at furthering the opportunities of African Americans both within society in general and within the health sciences. He was an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and served as its president from 1976 to 1982.^[4] He created the Imhotep Conferences on Hospital Integration in 1957 as a part of the NAACP, an annual conference seeking to end hospital and medical school segregation that continued until 1964.^[9] He was an active member of the National Medical Association, an organization dedicated to the advancement of African-American physicians and other health professionals.^[4][10] He was a longtime contributor to its journal, the Journal of the National Medical Association, of which he served as editor from 1944 to his death in 1990. He also served as the organization's president from 1964 to 1965.^[4] In addition to his involvement in both African-American and European American-led professional organizations and journals, Cobb was active in community outreach through work on race and health published in popular African-American magazines such as Negro Digest, Pittsburgh Courier, and Ebony.^[4]

Scholarship

[edit]

Throughout his career, Cobb applied his technical expertise in functional anatomy and medicine to a variety of topics, including the issues of African-American health, child development, and disproving scientific justifications for racism. His approach has been characterized as a form of applied anthropology and activist scholarship.^[4] His work explicitly critiqued hierarchical understandings of human variation, and he often subverted racist evolutionary arguments through highlighting the resiliency of African Americans. He took as an example the experience of the Transatlantic slave trade which he argued acted as a selective pressure and would have led to a genetically stronger population relative to European Americans who did not experience this population bottleneck.^[5]

Cobb often used his expertise in anatomy and biology in order to combat racist explanations for perceived differences between African Americans and European Americans. One of the most widely cited studies in this effort was Cobb's "Race and Runners," published in 1936. In this work, Cobb took the case of Jesse Owens to dispel the idea that his success as a quadruple gold medal winner could be explained by his " African-American genes," an argument that stemmed from the idea that Black people were stronger and more athletic than whites at the cost of decreased intelligence.^[5] Proponents of this idea often pointed to the supposed existence of extra musculature or differences in nerve thicknesses that allowed African-American athletes to excel relative to European Americans. Cobb addressed this question by surveying the anatomical characteristics of Owens as well as other prominent African Americans in different sports. Cobb demonstrated that not only could their successes not be explained by a shared racial trait, the physiology that would make a superior athlete in one sport would be very different from another. Instead, Cobb accounted for the achievements of African-American athletes relative to European Americans in sports as due to "training and incentive" rather than any "special physical endowment".^[11]

During the latter years of his career, Cobb took a more philosophical approach to his anatomical perspective of humanity. He often used biological metaphors to point to key issues within society. Cobb's most prominent philosophical contribution was arguably his 1975 publication, "An anatomist's view of human relations. Homo sanguinis versus Homo sapiens--mankind's present dilemma".^[4] This work focused primarily on the fundamental conflict in human nature he described as being between the civilized people suggested by our binomial designation Homo sapiens ("Man the Wise") and the much older and violent organism he described via his coined term Homo sanguinus ("Man the bloody").^[12] Cobb described the recent "adaptations" of civilization and ethics as similar to recently evolved anatomical traits like bipedalism, a key human trait which has nonetheless resulted in a host of health conditions due to our lineage's adaptations for quadrupedal locomotion. Cobb argued that man the wise is up against the ancient evolutionary tradition of man as a "bloody, predatory primate" and that this history of violence and hatred will thus be difficult to overcome.^[12] Cobb's final presented publication in 1988, "Human Variation: Informing the Public," applied his Homo sanguinus more closely to the rapid cultural change of the late 20th century.^[4] Cobb saw this period of rapid development as both a key opportunity for continued progress against racism and other forms of inequality and a potential for such issues to become more firmly embedded within the system of the society: "Just as an embryological defect cannot be corrected, so our mammoth construction programs can be wrong, which is not obvious until it is too late."^[13]

Legacy

[edit]

Cobb distinguished himself by representing the pursuit of social responsibility in the field of anthropology, as well as by being an activist scholar who often applied anthropological methods to issues of racism and inequality.^[4] He undertook studies within the scope of his expertise in anatomy that aimed at disproving racist explanations for social difference. He believed that scholars must take responsibility "not only for their own thoughts and actions but also for their own society" because the values that are expressed in scientific work, whether subtly or overtly, are key in the shaping of culture and society.^[2] He was one of the first anthropologist to undertake a demographic analysis that illustrated the consequences of segregation and racism on the African-American population, and he wanted to create the resources so he would not be the last.^[4] One of Cobb's greatest contributions to this end is the expansive skeletal collection he curated during his time at Howard University which is now housed at the university's W. Montague Cobb Research Laboratory, a research laboratory led by biological anthropologist Fatimah Jackson that also houses the New York African Burial Ground collection.^[1]

Cobb was long involved in African descendants' struggle for freedom, justice, and equality. He assumed a number of roles in African-American-led organizations, including the National Urban League and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, and he was a longtime editor of the first African-American medical journal, the Journal of the National Medical Association.^[14] He was a member of the board of directors for the NAACP from 1949 until his death and president from 1976 to 1982.^[4] Cobb played a key role in efforts to expand access to medical care through his active leadership in the National Medical Association, and this activism led to his testimony to congress during the hearings leading up to the passage of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. He was present at the signing of this bill into law by invitation of President Lyndon B. Johnson.^[15][16]

During his lifetime, Cobb was honored by more than 100 organizations for his efforts as a scholar and as an activist, including the American Association for Anatomy's highest award, the Henry Gray Award, which he received for his outstanding contributions in the field in 1980.^[4] He was also the recipient of the U.S. Navy's Distinguished Public Service Award and received honorary doctorates from several institutions, including the Medical College of Wisconsin, Georgetown University, the University of the Witwatersrand, Morgan State University, Howard University, and Amherst College.^[6] The American Association for Anatomy named the W.M. Cobb Award in Morphological Sciences after Cobb to honor his legacy with its first recipient in 2020.^[17]

Selected publications

[edit]

• "Human Archives" – 1932.
• "Race and Runners" –1936.
• "Cranio Facial Union of Man" – 1940.
• "The Cranio-Facial Union and the Maxillary Tuber in Mammals" – 1943.
• "Medical Care and the Plight of the Negro in Medicine" – 1947.
• "An anatomist's view of human relations. Homo sanguinis versus Homo sapiens--mankind's present dilemma" – 1975.
• "Human Rights—A New Fight in Cultural Evolution" – 1978.
• "The Black American in Medicine" – 1981.
• "Human Variation: Informing the Public" – 1988.

In addition those listed above, Cobb had more than 1100 publications on various topics.^[5]

888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

jnma00276-0081.pdf (nih.gov)

88888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

THE LEGACY OF WILLIAM MONTAGUE COBB, MD, PhD (1 904- 990) 1 Melvin 1. Douglass, PhD Huntington Station, New York The number of people whose lives have been affected by Dr William Montague Cobb is relatively small compared to the wide ranging impact of a Michael Jordan or an Oprah Winfrey. Nevertheless, the importance of Dr Cobb's life is so much greater than that of these well-known figures because Dr Cobb has taught and inspired men and women who have risen to positions of importance far beyond what their numbers suggest. They are the professors, physicians, and other professionals who are the driving forces of our society. EARLY LIFE AND DEVELOPMENT William Montague Cobb was born on October 12, 1904 in Washington, DC. He was the only child of William Elmer, a printer, and Alexzine (Montague) Cobb, a teacher. Cobb's parents taught him how to read and write before he entered school1: During his formative years, according to Cobb, before he reached school age he learned the basic rudiments of reading, writing, and computing from his mother. It was not long before he was able to read some of the magazines and books in the family's library. He also read religious materials that he received in his Sunday School class at the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church. When Cobb entered the segregated elementary schools (Patterson and Garnet) in Washington, DC, he was one of the best students in the class. In 1917, Cobb attended Paul Laurence Dunbar High School. The high school was named after the black writer and poet. At Dunbar, he was an outstanding student and athlete. His Requests for reprints should be addressed to Dr Melvin I. Douglass, Depts of English and Social Studies, Henry L. Stimson Middle School, 401 Oakwood Rd, Huntington Station, NY 1 1746. efforts earned him a scholarship to Amherst College, located in Amherst, Massachusetts. While at Amherst, Cobb continued to be outstanding in the classroom and on the playing field.2 To quote his biographical summary: "He.. .won college cross-country championships at Amherst and in successive years was college lightweight and welterweight boxing champion."2 Cobb received the AB degree from Amherst College in 1925. He also won the Blodgett Scholarship from the college that same year.2 Among the outstanding student athletes at Amherst College during Cobb's four years were: Charles Drew, who became a scientist; Mercer Cook, who became a US ambassador; and William Hasite, who became a federal judge. All of these men were also former students of Dunbar High School in Washington, DC. After graduation, Cobb enrolled at the Howard University College of Medicine. In 1929, he received the MD degree. Dr Cobb was licensed for the practice of medicine and surgery in the District of Columbia in 1930. His desire to learn as much as possible caused him to enroll in the PhD program at Western Reserve University. In 1932, Dr Cobb received a doctoral degree in anatomy His dissertation was titled "Human Archives."2 CAREER Urged by his former teacher, Dr Numa P.G. Adams, Dr Cobb entered the teaching profession. He started his career as an instructor in the anatomy department at Howard University College of Medicine in 1930 and ended his career as Distinguished Professor Emeritus in 1973. During this time, Dr Cobb taught more than 5000 medical, dental, and graduate students in the healthrelated sciences.2 While teaching his students, he would frequently mix the study of philosophy with the study of medicine. Dr JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, VOL. 84, NO. 10 885 MEDICAL HISTORY Cobb did so by asking the students to come up with an example of "new wisdom" for which he could not find an antecedent. He contended that there is a constant explosion of new knowledge but there is no new wisdom in the world.2 At his beloved alma mater, Dr Cobb built a collection of over 600 documented skeletons, a comparative anatomy museum in the gross anatomy laboratory, and a comprehensive collection of casts of fossil primates, hominids, and men.2 According to his biographical summary3: The concept and goals of this work were described in a bound brochure produced in 1936 at Dr Cobb's expense, entitled, "The Laboratory of Anatomy and Physical Anthropology of Howard University." This book of 107 pages and 25 illustrations was very favorably reviewed by the distinguished biologist of Johns Hopkins University, Dr Raymond Pear. Dr Cobb taught anatomy in a rather unique fashion to students at Howard3: He developed a graphic method of teaching and learning anatomy in which students learn to draw outlines of the human figure with the skeleton in it according to a canon of proportions, and subsequently to draw in all the structures uncovered as the dissection proceeds. In addition to teaching at Howard University College of Medicine, he taught at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, the University of Washington in Seattle, Stanford University, the University of Maryland, West Virginia University, Harvard Medical School, the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, and the Catholic University of America.3 During his teaching career, Dr Cobb authored nearly 700 published works. Among them are five books. In 1939, he wrote a small book entitled: The First Negro Medical Society: A History of the Medico-Chirurgical Society of the District of Columbia, 1844-1939. This historical treatise was published by Associated Publishers Inc under the supervision of Dr Carter G. Woodson. Dr Cobb had 1000 copies published for $650, of which half was to be submitted with the manuscript and the other half when the book was completed. He was told by Dr Woodson to sell the book for $2 per copy.4 "Incidentally, the price of this historical treatise is now $75. It is considered a collector's item."5 Dr Cobb also wrote an article that appeared in the Journal of Negro History. It was titled "Education in Human Biology: An Essential for the Present and Future." In addition to writing in historical journals, Dr Cobb was a contributing editor of the Journal of the National Medical Association (JNMA) for 28 years.2 While editor of the JNMA, he wrote numerous articles on prominent black figures such as Dr Charles Richard Drew, Dr Louis Tompkins Wright, Dr William Augustus Hinton, Dr Dorothy Boulding Ferebee, and Dr Jane Wright. As a result of his work, Dr Cobb was universally considered the principal historian of the black American in medicine. NAACP PAMPHLETS AND IMHOTEP CONFERENCES In 1947 and 1948, respectively, Dr Cobb wrote two pamphlets for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The first pamphlet was entitled "Medical Care and the Plight of the Negro." The second pamphlet was titled "Progress and Portents for the Negro in Medicine." Both of these scholarly works were well received by the medical community.2 With the aid of organizations like the NAACP and NMA, Dr Cobb organized the Imhotep National Conference on Hospital Integration. The purpose of the conference was to eliminate discrimination in our hospital systems through voluntary cooperation. There were seven Imhotep National Conferences in all.2 Dr Cobb pointed out that the Imhotep conference took its name from the Egyptian demigod of medicine who lived about 3000 BC. Imhotep was the first historical figure in medicine. His name means "He who cometh in peace."2 ORGANIZATIONAL ACTIVITIES In addition to his work with the Imhotep National Conference, Dr Cobb was involved with other organizations. He was president of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists, 1957-1959; the Anthropological Society of Washington, 1949-1951; NMA, 1964-1965; and NAACP, 1976-1982. He was also chairman of the NAACP Search and Screening Committee for an Executive Director in 1976.2 It was the NAACP's Search and Screening Committee that was primarily responsible for the hiring of Benjamin Lawson Hooks, the first black member of the Federal Communications Commission, to the post of Executive Director of the NAACP. Dr Cobb welcomed the appointment of Hooks. He stated that Benjamin L. Hooks understood "the vital role of communications in everyday life and communicating the goals, policies, and programs of the NAACP 886 JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, VOL. 84, NO. 10 MEDICAL HISTORY to the world, particularly to those citizens denied freedom and justice." ' In 1980, Dr Cobb had the pleasure of presenting the NAACP's highest award, the Spingarn Medal, to Rayford W. Logan for his monographs on conditions that affect blacks.6 HONORS Because of his outstanding contributions to medicine and civil rights, Dr Cobb received numerous awards. Among them are the Distinguished Public Service Award, "for exceptionally outstanding contributions to the US Navy in the fields of equal opportunity and community relations." Dr Cobb also received an honorary doctorate from Howard University (DHL, 1980), the Medical College of Wisconsin (ScD, 1979), Georgetown University (ScD, 1978), the University of the Witwatersrand (LLD, 1977), Morgan State College (LLD, 1964), and Amherst College (ScD, 1955). When the latter honorary degree was conferred on Dr Cobb, it was said to him: Author of scores of learned articles and works, you have cast light on such diverse subjects as the dentition of the walrus, the effects of aging on the human skeleton, graphical techniques of teaching anatomy, and the physical anthropology of the American Negro. Teacher, scholar, scientist, physician, you have strived valiantly for the cause of interracial justice and understanding and by your efforts that cause has been measurably advanced in the whole field of medical care. In 1981, Dr Cobb was selected by Ciba-Geigy Corporation for its "Exceptional Black Scientists Poster Series." One year earlier, he was the subject of the writer's doctoral dissertation entitled "The Black Family as a Matrix of Achievement: The Historical Case of Dr William Montague Cobb." The study was the first in-depth historical study of Dr Cobb and certain key members of his family. It is housed in the library at Columbia University in New York City. EPILOGUE Dr Cobb's family was important to him, but his work was also important. He devoted his life to medical scholarship and civic leadership. As a result, Dr Cobb's contributions were numerous. Yet, his death on November 20, 1990 in Washington, DC, was not widely publicized in the media. Dr Cobb is survived by two daughters, Carolyn Wilkerson and Amelia Gray, and four grandchildren. His wife of 47 years, Hilda B. Smith, died in 1976. "Sic transit gloria mundi." (Thus passes the glory of the world.)2 Literature Cited 1. Douglass MI. The Black Family as a Matrix of Achievement: The Historical Case of Dr William Montague Cobb. New York, NY: Columbia University Teachers College; 1981. Doctoral dissertation. 2. Douglass Ml. Dr William Montague Cobb (1904-1990): the principal historian of Afro-Americans in medicine. Crisis Magazine. 1991;98:30-31, 40. 3. Cobb WM. Biographical Summary. Washington, DC; 1981:1-3. 4. Cobb WM. Carter Godwin Woodson. Negro History Bulletin. 1973;36:152-153. 5. Douglass Ml. Carter Godwin Woodson: a biography. The Prince Hall Sentinel. 1990;40:15. 6. Douglass MI. Black Winners: A History of Spingarn Medalists, 1915-1983. New York, NY: Theo Gaus Ltd; 1984. JOURNAL OF THE NATIONAL MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, VOL. 84, NO. 10

A00043 - Beatrice Mtetwa, Human Rights Lawyer and Activist

 88888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

Beatrice Mtetwa is a Swazi was born 1957^[1] and naturalised Zimbabwean lawyer who has been internationally recognized for her defense of journalists and press freedom. The New York Times described her in 2008 as "Zimbabwe's top human rights lawyer".^[2]

Mtetwa received her LLB from the University of Botswana and Swaziland in 1981 and spent the next two years working as a prosecuting attorney in Swaziland.^[3] In 1983, she moved to Zimbabwe, where she continued working as a prosecutor until 1989.^[3] That year, she went into private practice, and soon began specializing in human rights law.^[3] In one of her more notable cases, she successfully challenged a section of Zimbabwe's Private Voluntary Organizations Act which allowed a government minister the authority to dissolve or replace the board members of non-governmental organizations.^[3] She also challenged the results of 37 districts in the 2000 parliamentary elections.^[3] In a PBS documentary, Mtetwa described her motives for her activism as "not because there is any glory or cash to it and not because I'm trying to antagonize the government... I'm doing it because it's a job that's got to be done".^[4]

Mtetwa is particularly noted for her defense of arrested journalists, both local and international.^[5] In 2003, for example, she won a court order preventing the deportation of Guardian reporter Andrew Meldrum, presenting it to security officials at Harare International Airport only minutes before Meldrum's plane was scheduled to depart.^[6] She also won acquittals for detained reporters Toby Harnden and Julian Simmonds from London's Sunday Telegraph, who had been arrested during coverage of the April parliamentary election on charges of working without government accreditation.^[5] In April 2008, she secured the release of New York Times reporter Barry Bearak, who had been imprisoned on similar charges.^[2] She also defended many local journalists arrested in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election.^[7] Mtetwa is also a director who sits on Econet board .

Mtetwa and Tawanda Nyambirai founded Mtetwa & Nyambirai Legal Practitioners in 2006 and it has established itself over the past decade as one of Zimbabwe's leading law firms. Mtetwa & Nyambirai's history is punctuated by landmark cases in multiple areas of the law. With Econet Wireless’s the largest telecommunications company in Zimbabwe being the firms most notable clients, the Econet name appears on many of those landmark cases. These include cases such as Econet Wireless v Trustco Mobile, and Derdale v Econet Wireless which is now the seminal case on the inherent jurisdiction of the High Court under the 2013 Constitution of Zimbabwe.

Mtetwa's firm has been involved with multiple high-profile human rights cases. Notably, we were instrumental in the recovery of abducted activist Jestina Mukoko — who was held incommunicado and tortured for nearly a month in 2008. Mtetwa subsequently handled a string of related legal cases that followed, including securing a stay of prosecution for Ms Mukoko and suing her abductors for damages in their personal capacity. Over the years, the Mtetwa and Nyambirai has grown into a full service law firm with the capacity to handle matters relating to all aspects of Zimbabwean law.^[8]

In 2003, Mtetwa was arrested on allegations of drunk driving. At the police station, she was reportedly beaten and choked before being released three hours later without a formal charge. Though unable to speak for two days after the attack, she returned on the third day with a folder of medical evidence in order to file charges against the police officers who assaulted her.^[5] Police officers reportedly attacked Mtetwa again in 2007, beating her and three colleagues with rubber truncheons during a march protesting harassment of Zimbabwe's lawyers.^[7][9]

In an interview with the Committee to Protect Journalists, Mtetwa described her procedure for averting potential attacks:

"I think I confront the danger immediately before it happens. I always make sure that if, for instance, I'm called in the middle of the night to a scene that is potentially dangerous, I make sure that there are as many media practitioners as possible, particularly to record what will happen there. And in the glare of cameras I find that people don't want to do what they would want to do. So in a lot of ways I think I've been lucky, and I haven't received as much harassment as one would have expected, or as much as other human rights defenders have had."^[5]

On 17 March 2013, Mtetwa was arrested while executing her professional duties. She was attending to a client whose home was searched by the police. Mtetwa was placed under arrest after requesting the production of a valid search warrant and an inventory list of items that had already been removed. Her mobile phone, containing privileged attorney-client communication, was confiscated. She was charged with defeating and / or obstructing the course of justice under the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act, section 184(1)(g).

The Zimbabwean police defied an emergency high court ruling ordering the release of Mtetwa and continued to hold her on charges of obstructing justice. After more than a week in jail, Mtetwa was released on Monday 25 March 2013 after a high court judge overruled a lower court's decision that she be held without bail on a charge of obstruction of justice.

On November 26, 2013, Magistrate Rumbidzai Mugwagwa said Mtetwa had no case to answer to. Magistrate Mugwagwa found that there was no evidence to suggest that Mtetwa caused the police to fail to perform their duties.^[10]

In 2005, she won the International Press Freedom Award of the Committee to Protect Journalists.^[5] The award citation stated that "in a country where the law is used as a weapon against independent journalists, Mtetwa has defended journalists and argued for press freedom, all at great personal risk."^[5] She also won the group's Burton Benjamin Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2008.^[7]

Mtetwa was also received several awards from legal organizations. In 2009, the European Bar Human Rights Institute awarded her the Ludovic-Trarieux International Human Rights Prize ("The award given by lawyers to a lawyer"), reserved each year to a lawyer who throughout his or her career has illustrated, by activity or suffering, the defence of human rights in the world.^[11] Mtetwa also won the 2010 International Human Rights award of the American Bar Association.^[3] In 2011, she was awarded the Inamori Ethics Prize by Case Western Reserve University in the US.^[12] In 2014 she was a recipient of the International Women of Courage Award.^[13]

St. Francis Xavier University, located in Nova Scotia, Canada, was the first university to celebrate Mtetwa's many achievements by presenting her with an honorary degree in May 2013.

In December 2013 Mtetwa was awarded with an honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD) by the University of Bath in the United Kingdom in recognition of her work.^[14]

In April 2016, Mtetwa was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD) degree by Rhodes University in South Africa in recognition of her achievements in the promotion and protection of human rights in Zimbabwe.

88888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

Beatrice Mtetwa is a Zimbabwean lawyer who has been internationally recognized for her defense of journalists and press freedom.  The New York Times described her in 2008 as "Zimbabwe's top human rights lawyer".

Mtetwa received her LLB from the University of Botswana and Swaziland in 1981 and spent the next two years working as a prosecuting attorney in Swaziland. In 1983, she moved to Zimbabwe, where she continued working as a prosecutor until 1989. That year, she went into private practice, and soon began specializing in human rights law. In one of her more notable cases, she successfully challenged a section of Zimbabwe's Private Voluntary Organizations Act which allowed a government minister the authority to dissolve or replace the board members of non-governmental organizations. She also challenged the results of 37 districts in the 2000 parliamentary elections. In a PBS documentary, Mtetwa described her motives for her activism as "not because there is any glory or cash to it and not because I'm trying to antagonize the government... I'm doing it because it's a job that's got to be done".

Mtetwa is particularly noted for her defense of arrested journalists, both local and international. In 2003, for example, she won a court order preventing the deportation of Guardian reporter Andrew Meldrum, presenting it to security officials at Harare International Airport only minutes before Meldrum's plane was scheduled to depart. She also won acquittals for detained reporters Toby Hamden and Julian Simmonds from London's Sunday Telegraph, who had been arrested during coverage of the April parliamentary election on charges of working without government accreditation. In April 2008, she secured the release of New York Times reporter Barry Bearak, who had been imprisoned on similar charges. She also defended many local journalists arrested in the run-up to the 2008 presidential election.

In 2003, Mtetwa was arrested on allegations of drunk driving.  At the police station, she was reportedly beaten and choked before being released three hours later without a formal charge. Though unable to speak for two days after the attack, she returned on the third day with a folder of medical evidence in order to file charges against the police officers who assaulted her. Police officers reportedly attacked Mtetwa again in 2007, beating her and three colleagues with rubber truncheons during a march protesting harassment of Zimbabwe's lawyers.

In an interview with the Committee to Protect Journalists, Mtetwa described her procedure for averting potential attacks:

"I think I confront the danger immediately before it happens. I always make sure that if, for instance, I'm called in the middle of the night to a scene that is potentially dangerous, I make sure that there are as many media practitioners as possible, particularly to record what will happen there. And in the glare of cameras I find that people don't want to do what they would want to do. So in a lot of ways I think I've been lucky, and I haven't received as much harassment as one would have expected, or as much as other human rights defenders have had."

In 2005, she won the Interantional Press Freedom Award of the Committed to Protect Journalists.  The award citation stated that "in a country where the law is used as a weapon against independent journalists, Mtetwa has defended journalists and argued for press freedom, all at great personal risk."  She also won the group's Burton Benjamin Memorial Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2008.

Mtetwa was also received several awards from legal organizations. In 2009, the European Bar Human Rights Institute awarded her the Ludovic-Trarieux International Human Rights Prize ("The award given by lawyers to a lawyer"), reserved each year to a lawyer who throughout his or her career has illustrated, by activity or suffering, the defense of human rights in the world.  Mtetwa also won the 2010 International Human Rights award of the American Bar Association.  In 2011, she was awarded the Inamori Ethics Prize by Case Western Reserve University in the United States.  And, most recently (2014), she was named a recipient of the International Women of Courage Award that is annually given out by the United States Department of State to women around the world who have shown leadership, courage, resourcefulness and willingness to sacrifice for others, especially for better promotion of women's rights.  

8888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888

A00042 - Unity Dow, Commissioner of the International Commission of Jurists

 Unity Dow (b. April 23, 1959, Botswana) was a Motswana judge, human rights activist and writer currently serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.  She came from a rural background that tended toward traditional values. She successfully challenged the law that argued that citizenship was inherited by children from the fathers and not from their mothers. She also went to court to argue that a gay rights group was legal and not unconstitutional in the law of Botswana.

Dow studied law at the University of Botswana and Swaziland (LLB 1983), which included two years spent studying at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.  Her Western education caused a mixture of respect and suspicion.

In 1991, Unity Dow co-founded the private Baobab Primary School in Gaborone and she co-founded the first AIDS-specific NGO in the country, "AIDS ACTION TRUST."

Dow earned her acclaim as a lawyer particularly through her stances on women's rights. She was the plaintiff in a case that allowed the children of women with Botswana citizenship by foreign national fathers to be considered citizens of Botswana (Attorney General of Botswana v. Unity Dow (1992).  Before this case, according to tradition and prior precedent, nationality only descended from the father. She later became Botswana's first female High Court judge. She was also co-founder of the first all-female law practice Dow, Malakaila, and was one of the founding members of the women's organization Emang Basadi.

As a novelist, Dow published five books. These books often deal with issues concerning the struggle between Western and traditional values and also involve her interest in gender issues and her nation's poverty.  Dow contributed to the book Schicksal Afrika (Destiny Africa) by the former German President Horst Koehler in 2009. In May 2010, she published her book, Saturday is for Funerals, which describes the AIDS problem in Africa.  

In 2005, Unity Dow became a member of a United Nations mission to Sierra Leone to review the domestic application of international women's human rights. On December 13, 2006, she was one of three judges who ruled on the acclaimed Kgalagadi (San, Bushmen or Basarwa) court decision, concerning the rights of the San to return to their ancestral lands.

In 2007, Unity Dow became a Member of a special mission at the invitation of the Rwandan Government and United Nations special court for Rwanda. The purpose of this mission was to review the Rwandan Judiciaries preparedness to take over the hearing of the 1994 genocide cases.

Dow was a visiting professor of Law at the Columbia University School of Law in New York, during the fall semester 2009, and at Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia, 2009, and University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, 2009.

After retiring from the High Court Botswana in 2009, after 11 years of service, she opened the legal firm "Dow & Associates" in Botswana in February 2010. Dow was also sworn in as Justice of the IICDRC (Interim Independent Constitutional Dispute Resolution Court) of Kenya by the Kenyan President to help implement the new constitution of Kenya.

On July 14, 2010, Dow was awarded the Medal of the Legion d'honneur de France by representatives of the French President Nicolas Sarkozy for her human rights activities.

At the Women of the World Summit in March 2011 and 2012 in New York, Unity Dow was mentioned as one of 150 women who shake the world.

Unity Dow also served as Commissioner of the International Commission of Jurists. She was first elected in 2004 and re-elected in 2009. In 2006 she was also elected to the Executive Committee and subsequently re-elected in 2008. In March 2011 she was elected the Chairperson of the Executive Committee, succeeding Dr. Rajeev Dhayan, of India, effective from June 2011 to June 2012.

Unity Dow is the only motswana listed under the world recognized feminists for her advocacy for women rights from the period of 1940 to present.

On 6 July 2012 Dow was appointed by the United Nations Human Rights Council as one of three independent experts to conduct a fact-finding mission on how Israel's West Bank settlements affect Palestinians. A preliminary version of the report was published on January 31, 2013.

In 2013, Dow decided to enter politics. On October 28, 2014. Dow was nominated by former President Ian Khama of Botswana as "special elected member of parliament" and confirmed by the new 11th Parliament of Botswana. Dow was also appointed Assistant Minister of Education in the Government of Botswana, responsible for Higher / Tertiary Education and Skills Development.

On November 14, 2014, Dow was successful in representing LEGABIBO, the Lesbians, Gays, and Bisexuals of Botswana in a trial versus the State of Botswana to register LEGABIBO as an organization in Botswana. Previously the State had refused the registration on arguments it would be unconstitutional. On March 1, 2015, Dow was appointed Minister of Education and Skills Development in the Government of Botswana.

After the inauguration of the fifth President of Botswana Mokgweetsi E. Masisi on April 1, 2018, Unity Dow took over as Minister of Infrastructure and Housing Development in the Government of Botswana. On June 20, 2018, in a cabinet reshuffle, she was named Minister of International Affairs and Cooperation. After re-election of Dr. Mokgweetsi E. Masisi on November 1, 2019 as President of Botswana, Unity Dow was reconfirmed as Minister of International Affairs and Cooperation by the 12th parliament of Botswana.

A00041 - Lorraine Hansberry, Author of "A Raisin in the Sun"

*Playwright Lorraine Hansberry, the author of A Raisin in the Sun, was born in Chicago (May 19),

Lorraine Vivian Hansberry (b. May 19, 1930, Chicago, Illinois – d. January 12, 1965, New York City, New York) was an American playwright and writer. Hansberry inspired Nina Simone's song "To Be Young, Gifted and Black". 

She was the first black woman to write a play performed on Broadway. Her best known work, the play A Raisin in the Sun,  highlights the lives of African Americans living under racial segregation in Chicago. Hansberry's family had struggled against segregation, challenging a restrictive covenant and eventually provoking the Supreme Court case Hansberry v. Lee.  The title of her most famous play was taken from the poem "Harlem" by Langston Hughes: "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?"

After she moved to New York City, Hansberry worked at the Pan-Africanist newspaper Freedom, where she dealt with intellectuals such as Paul Robeson and W. E. B. Du Bois.  Much of her work during this time concerned the African struggle for liberation and their impact on the world. Hansberry has been identified as a lesbian, and sexual freedom is an important topic in several of her works. She died of cancer at the age of 34.

Lorraine Hansberry was born in a comfortable, middle-class family in Chicago, and was educated at the University of Wisconsisn  and Roosevelt University.  She first appeared in print in Paul Robeson's Freedom, a monthly newspaper, during the early 1950's.  In 1959, A Raisin in the Sun, her first play, was produced on Broadway.  It was among the first full-length African American plays to be taken seriously by a European American audience.  

The success of A Raisin in the Sun catapulted Hansberry to an early fame.  She was expected to be a spokesperson for the African American poor, when in fact she was more attuned to the aspirations of the African American bourgeoisie.  Hansberry was very militant about integration and not supportive of black nationalist or separatist movements.

Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was the first black woman to write a play performed on Broadway. Her best known work, the play A Raisin in the Sun, highlights the lives of Black Americans living under racial segregation in Chicago. Hansberry's family had struggled against segregation, challenging a restrictive covenant and eventually provoking the Supreme Court case Hansberry v. Lee. The title of the play was taken from the poem "Harlem" by Langston Hughes: "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?"

At the young age of 29, Hansberry won the New York's Drama Critic's Circle Award — making her the first black dramatist, the fifth woman, and the youngest playwright to do so.

After she moved to New York City, Hansberry worked at the Pan-Africanist newspaper Freedom, where she dealt with intellectuals such as Paul Robeson and W. E. B. DuBois. Much of her work during this time concerned the African struggle for liberation and their impact on the world. Hansberry has been identified as a lesbian, and sexual freedom is an important topic in several of her works. She died of cancer at the age of 34. Hansberry inspired Nina Simone's song "To Be Young, Gifted and Black".

Lorraine Hansberry was the youngest of four children born to Carl Augustus Hansberry, a successful real-estate broker, and Nannie Louise (born Perry) a driving school teacher and ward committeewoman. In 1938, her father bought a house in the Washington Park Subdivision of the South Side of Chicago, incurring the wrath of their white neighbors. The latter's legal efforts to force the Hansberry family out culminated in the United States Supreme Court's decision in Hansberry v. Lee. The restrictive covenant was ruled contestable, though not inherently invalid. Carl Hansberry was also a supporter of the Urban League and NAACP in Chicago. Both Hansberrys were active in the Chicago Republican Party. Carl died in 1946, when Lorraine was fifteen years old; "American racism helped kill him," she later said.

The Hansberrys were routinely visited by prominent Black intellectuals, including W. E. B. DuBois and Paul Robeson. Carl Hansberry's brother, William Leo Hansberry, founded the African Civilization section of the history department at Howard University. Lorraine was taught: ‘‘Above all, there were two things which were never to be betrayed: the family and the race.’’

Hansberry became the godmother to Nina Simone's daughter Lisa—now Simone.

Hansberry graduated from Betsy Ross Elementary in 1944 and from Englewood High School in 1948. She attended the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she immediately became politically active and integrated a dormitory.

She worked on Henry A. Wallace's presidential campaign in 1948, despite her mother's disapproval. She spent the summer of 1949 in Mexico, studying painting at the University of Guadalajara.

She decided in 1950 to leave Madison and pursue her career as a writer in New York City, where she attended The New School. She moved to Harlem in 1951 and became involved in activist struggles such as the fight against evictions.

In 1951, she joined the staff of the black newspaper Freedom, edited by Louis E. Burnham and published by Paul Robeson.  At Freedom, she worked with W. E. B. Du Bois, whose office was in the same building, and other Black Pan-Africanists. At the newspaper, she worked as subscription clerk, receptionist, typist and editorial assistant in addition to writing news articles and editorials.

One of her first reports covered the Sojourners for Truth and Justice convened in Washington, D.C., by Mary Church Terrell.  She traveled to Georgia to cover the case of Willie McGee, and was inspired to write the poem "Lynchsong" about his case.

She worked not only on the United States civil rights movement, but also on global struggles against colonialism and imperialism. Hansberry wrote in support of the Mau Mau Uprising in Kenya, criticizing the mainstream press for its biased coverage.

Hansberry often clarified these global struggles by explaining them in terms of female participants. She was particularly interested in the situation of Egypt, "the traditional Islamic 'cradle of civilization,' where women had led one of the most important fights anywhere for the equality of their sex."

In 1952, Hansberry attended a peace conference in Montevideo, Uruguay, in place of Paul Robeson, who had been denied travel rights by the State Department.

On June 20, 1953, Hansberry married Robert Nemiroff, a Jewish publisher, songwriter and political activist. Hansberry and Nemiroff moved to Greenwich Village, the setting of The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window.  Success of the song "Cindy, Oh Cindy", co-authored by Nemiroff, enabled Hansberry to start writing full-time. On the night before their wedding in 1953, Nemiroff and Hansberry protested the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in NYC.

It is widely believed that Hansberry was a closeted lesbian, a theory supported by her secret writings in letters and personal notebooks. She was an activist for gay rights and wrote about feminism and homophobia, joining the Daughters of Bilitis and contributing two letters to their magazine, The Ladder, in 1957 under her initials "LHN." She separated from her husband at this time, but they continued to work together.

A Raisin in the Sun was written at this time and completed in 1957.

Opening on March 11, 1959, A Raisin in the Sun became the first play written by an African American woman to be produced on Broadway.  The 29-year-old author became the youngest American playwright and only the fifth woman to receive the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play. Over the next two years, Raisin was translated into 35 languages and was being performed all over the world.

Hansberry wrote two screenplays of Raisin, both of which were rejected as controversial by Columbia Pictures. Commissioned by NBC in 1960 to create a television program about slavery, Hansberry wrote The Drinking Gourd. This script was also rejected.

In 1960, during Delta Sigma Theta's 26th national convention in Chicago, Hansberry was made an honorary member.

In 1961, Hansberry was set to replace Vinnette Carroll as the director of the musical Kicks and Co, after its try-out at Chicago's McCormick Place. It was written by Oscar Brown, Jr. and featured an interracial cast including Lonnie Sattin, Nichelle Nichols, Vi Velasco, Al Freeman, Jr., Zabeth Wilde and Burgess Meredith in the title role of Mr. Kicks. A satire involving miscegenation, the $400,000 production was co-produced by her husband Robert Nemiroff. Despite a warm reception in Chicago, the show never made it to Broadway.

In 1963, Hansberry participated in a meeting with Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, set up by James Baldwin. 

Also in 1963, Hansberry was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She underwent two operations, on June 24 and August 2. Neither was successful in removing the cancer.

On March 10, 1964, Hansberry and Nemiroff divorced but continued to work together.

While many of her other writings were published in her lifetime—essays, articles, and the text for the SNCC book The Movement — the only other play given a contemporary production was The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window. The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window ran for 101 performances on Broadway and closed the night she died.

Hansberry was an atheist.

Hansberry believed that gaining civil rights in the United States and obtaining independence in colonial Africa were two sides of the same coin that presented similar challenges for Africans on both sides of the Atlantic. In response to the independence of Ghana, led by Kwame Nkrumah, Hansberry wrote: "The promise of the future of Ghana is that of all the colored peoples of the world; it is the promise of freedom."

Regarding tactics, Hansberry said Blacks "must concern themselves with every single means of struggle: legal, illegal, passive, active, violent and non-violent.... They must harass, debate, petition, give money to court struggles, sit-in, lie-down, strike, boycott, sing hymns, pray on steps—and shoot from their windows when the racists come cruising through their communities."

In a Town Hall debate on June 15, 1964, Hansberry criticized white liberals who could not accept civil disobedience, expressing a need "to encourage the white liberal to stop being a liberal and become an American radical." At the same time, she said, "some of the first people who have died so far in this struggle have been white men."

The Federal Bureau of Investigation began surveillance of Hansberry when she prepared to go to the Montevideo peace conference. The Washington, D.C. office searched her passport files "in an effort to obtain all available background material on the subject, any derogatory information contained therein, and a photograph and complete description," while officers in Milwaukee and Chicago examined her life history. Later, an FBI reviewer of Raisin in the Sun highlighted its Pan-Africanist themes as dangerous.

Hansberry, a heavy smoker her whole life, died of pancreatic cancer on January 12, 1965, aged 34. James Baldwin believed "it is not at all farfetched to suspect that what she saw contributed to the strain which killed her, for the effort to which Lorraine was dedicated is more than enough to kill a man."

Hansberry's funeral was held in Harlem on January 15, 1965. Paul Robeson and SNCC organizer James Forman gave eulogies. The presiding minister, Eugene Callender, recited messages from Baldwin and the Martin Luther King, Jr. which read: "Her creative ability and her profound grasp of the deep social issues confronting the world today will remain an inspiration to generations yet unborn." The 15th was also Dr. King's birthday. Hansberry was buried at Asbury United Methodist Church Cemetery in Croton-on-Hudson, New York. 

Hansberry's ex-husband, Robert Nemiroff, became the executor for several unfinished manuscripts. He added minor changes to complete the play Les Blancs, and he adapted many of her writings into the play To Be Young, Gifted and Black, which was the longest-running Off Broadway play of the 1968–69 season. It appeared in book form the following year under the title To Be Young, Gifted and Black: Lorraine Hansberry in Her Own Words. She left behind an unfinished novel and several other plays, including The Drinking Gourd and What Use Are Flowers?, with a range of content, from slavery to a post-apocalyptic future.

Raisin, a musical based on A Raisin in the Sun,  opened in New York in 1973, winning the Tony Award for Best Musical, with the book by Nemiroff, music by Judd Woldin, and lyrics by Robert Britten. A Raisin in the Sun was revived on Broadway in 2004 and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Revival of a Play. The cast included Sean Combs ("P Diddy") as Walter Lee Younger Jr., Phylicia Rashad (Tony Award-winner for Best Actress) and Audra McDonald (Tony Award-winner for Best Featured Actress).  It was produced for television in 2008 with the same cast, garnering two NAACP Image Awards.

Nina Simone first released a song about Hansberry in 1969 called "To Be Young, Gifted and Black".  The title of the song refers to the title of Hansberry's autobiography, which Hansberry first coined when speaking to the winners of a creative writing conference on May 1, 1964, "though it be a thrilling and marvelous thing to be merely young and gifted in such times, it is doubly so, doubly dynamic — to be young, gifted and black." Simone wrote the song with a poet named Weldon Irvine and told him that she wanted lyrics that would "make black children all over the world feel good about themselves forever." When Irvine read the lyrics after it was finished, he thought, "I didn't write this. God wrote it through me." In a recorded introduction to the song, Simone explained the difficulty of losing a close friend and talented artist.

Patricia and Frederick McKissack wrote a children's biography of Hansberry, Young, Black, and Determined, in 1998.

In 1999, Hansberry was posthumously inducted into the Chicago Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame.

In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Hansberry as one of his 100 Greatest African Americans.

The Lorraine Hansberry Theatre of San Francisco, which specializes in original stagings and revivals of African-American theatre, is named in her honor. Singer and pianist Nina Simone,  who was a close friend of Hansberry, used the title of her unfinished play to write a civil rights-themed song "To Be Young, Gifted and Black" together with Weldon Irvine. The single reached the top 10 on the R&B charts. A studio recording by Simone was released as a single and the first live recording on October 26, 1969, was captured on Black Gold (1970).

In 2013 Hansberry was inducted into the Legacy Walk, an outdoor public display which celebrates LGBT history and people. 

In 2013, Lorraine Hansberry was posthumously inducted into the American Theatre Hall of Fame.