An African American 'mother of the nation': Madie Hall Xuma in South Africa, 1940-1963

Madie Hall was among the most prominent African Americans to live in South Africa during the twentieth century. She arrived in the country in 1940 to marry Dr A. B. Xuma, the highly respected physician who was soon to become President of the African National Congress. By the time she left in 1963, f ollowing her husband's death, Hall had helped to re-vitalise the Women's Le ague of the African National Congress (ANC) and had launched the Zenzele cl ubs, an influential network of women's organisations eventually linked to t he international Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA). Yet, evaluatin g the accomplishments of her life in South Africa is complex. While some co ntemporaries and historians have dismissed the Zenzele clubs for their dome stic orientation, labelling them as apolitical organisations, I would argue that the clubs were linked to a profoundly political philosophy of African American advancement and racial uplift. Furthermore, Hall believed adamant ly in women's rights, perceiving Americans as having `more advanced' attitu des toward women than South Africans. By the 1950s, however, ideas of racia l uplift had become an anachronistic survival of an earlier age and women's politics were validated primarily by their association with struggles agai nst apartheid. Nonetheless, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, as a new Sou th African women's movement began to define its objectives, Hall's desire t o live a free and independent life would have resonated as a sympathetic vo ice from the past.