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WORK TITLE: Amy Biehl’s Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa
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PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE:
CITY:
STATE: AL
COUNTRY: United States
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http://www.aum.edu/profiles/steven-gish
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1963.
EDUCATION:Northwestern University, B.A.; Stanford University, M.A., Ph.D.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Auburn University, Montgomery, AL, Distinguished Research Professor.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Auburn University distinguished research professor of history Steven D. Gish specializes in the study of modern post-apartheid South Africa. His monographs include biographies of South African Anglican archbishop Desmond Tutu (Desmond Tutu: A Biography) and Alfred B. Xuma, president of the African National Congress during the 1940s (Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African). “Despite his importance, Xuma has long been on the margins of South African historical writing,” Gish explained in his introduction to Alfred B. Xuma. “Most works that mention Xuma do so only in passing. When he is remembered, he is often described as having been part of the ANC’s ‘conservative old guard,’ a group of senior ANC leaders who were allegedly meek, hesitant, and unwilling to challenge the status quo in South Africa.”
As Gish’s subtitle implies, Xuma had a connection to the United States. Before the U.S. entered World War I, he crossed the Atlantic to attend Tuskegee Institute for four years, and he embraced the race-relations ideology of American educator Booker T. Washington. “Xuma’s identity contained several distinct strands—Africa, American, and South African,” Gish continued in his introduction to Alfred B. Xuma. “That he was an African from South Africa is self-evident. Xuma never literally became an American citizen, but his American experiences were so extensive and influential that they became an indelible part of his character. Few Africans embodied the links between black South Africans and African Americans as dramatically as Xuma did. His exposure to black American ideas both radicalized and moderated his political outlook.” “But Xuma later modified Washington’s philosophy in important ways,” Gish added. “Far from accepting racial segregation, Xuma condemned all forms of enforced separation.”
In Amy Biehl’s Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa, Gish examines in detail the circumstances surrounding the murder of an American student who traveled to South Africa during the breakup of the apartheid government to help black South Africans. “Amy,” Gish wrote in his introduction to Amy Biehl’s Last Home, “captured people’s attention because of the supreme irony of her death. She had worked closely with black South Africans and supported the transition to majority rule, but she was killed by a group of young blacks who regarded her as a ‘settler’ because of her white skin.” Biehl was working in Gugulethu township and was driving some black colleagues home from work when she was attacked and stabbed to death. “Singiswa Bevu, one of the women Miss Biehl was driving home, said scores of young men converged on the car, first chanting Pan-Africanist slogans, then bombarding the car with stones,” reported Bill Keller in the New York Times. “She was stabbed in the hand trying to defend her friend.”
However, Amy Biehl’s Last Home is about more than just the circumstances of the American’s death; it is also about the ways in which Amy’s friends and family came to terms with her death and forgave her killers. “Steven Gish brings Amy and the Foundation to life in ways that have eluded previous authors,” wrote a contributor to the Ohio University Press website “He is the first to place Biehl’s story in its full historical context, while also presenting a gripping portrait of this remarkable young woman and the aftermath of her death across two continents.” “After her death,” Gish continued, “Amy was widely regarded as one of the many foot soldiers in South Africa’s struggle for democracy and human rights. In the years that followed her parents became icons of forgiveness and reconciliation.” “In the years since her death, Amy Biehl has been memorialized in numerous ways—by the monument in Gugulethu, in a novel and play by Sindiwe Magona (Mother to Mother), in a documentary film on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (Long Night’s Journey into Day), and through the continuing work of the Amy Biehl Foundation…. In the minds of many South Africans and Americans, the Biehls’ story lives on. This book seeks to explain why.” “Readers interested in reconciliation processes and justice movements,” said a Publishers Weekly contributor, “will find this study illuminating and moving.”
BIOCRIT
BOOKS
Gish, Steven D., Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African, New York University Press (New York, NY), 2000.
PERIODICALS
New York Times, August 27, 1993, Bill Keller, “How American ‘Sister’ Died in a Township,” p. A1.
Publishers Weekly, April 30, 2018, review of Amy Biehl’s Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa, p. 52.
ONLINE
Auburn University at Montgomery website, http://www.aum.edu/ (August 29, 2018), author profile.
Steven D. Gish is a professor of history at Auburn University at Montgomery. His previous books include Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African and Desmond Tutu: A Biography. He has traveled widely in South Africa since the 1980s and has interviewed key figures in the antiapartheid movement, including Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Desmond Tutu, Trevor Huddleston, and Beyers Naudé.
Steven Gish
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Distinguished Research Professor
Department
History & World Languages & Cultures
Office Location
342 Liberal Arts
Phone
334-244-3958
Fax
334-244-3740
Email
sgish@aum.edu
Education
B.A., history, Northwestern University
M.A., history, Stanford University
Ph.D., history, Stanford University
Bio:
Originally from Iowa, Dr. Steven Gish joined the Department of History in 1997. He specializes in Sub-Saharan African history and conducts research on modern South African history. Among his publications are Cultures of the World - Ethiopia (Marshall Cavendish, 1996; 2nd edition, 2007) and Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African (New York University Press and Macmillan, 2000; South African History Online, 2012). He also wrote Desmond Tutu: A Biography (Greenwood Press, 2004; paperback edition, 2008). He is currently working on a book dealing with the 1993 murder of Amy Biehl, a young American Fulbright scholar who was killed in the Gugulethu township of South Africa where she worked with anti-apartheid groups.
Amy Biehl's Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa
Publishers Weekly. 265.18 (Apr. 30, 2018): p52.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Amy Biehl's Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa
Steven D. Gish. Ohio Univ., $28.95 (384p)
ISBN 978-0-8214-2321-9
The brutal killing of American Amy Biehl in Gugulethu township, South Africa, in 1993 by radical members of the Pan Africanist Students' Organization, is the subject of this examination from historian Gish (Desmond Tutw. A Biography). The book begins with a straightforward account of Biehl's short time in South Africa as a Fulbright Scholar that situates her death in the context of the rising violence that threatened to derail the country's transition to democracy. The men accused of her murder were later granted amnesty by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a decision not opposed by Biehl's parents. While Gish's narrative of the events of this time is accurate, the material has all been covered before, and he does little to bring new perspective to it. He does, however, break new ground with his account of the establishment of the Amy Biehl Foundation, launched by Biehl's parents to raise money for development projects in the townships (even hiring two of Amy's killers as employees), and the speaking tours Biehl's parents have gone on to promote reconciliation over retribution, which have not been previously written about by historians. Readers interested in reconciliation processes and justice movements will find this study illuminating and moving. Photos. (June)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Amy Biehl's Last Home: A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa." Publishers Weekly, 30 Apr. 2018, p. 52. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A537852292/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=60a5a146. Accessed 28 July 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A537852292
Amy Biehl’s Last Home
A Bright Life, a Tragic Death, and a Journey of Reconciliation in South Africa
By Steven D. Gish
“If ever there was a book for our time, this is it. Amy Biehl’s story is painful and inspirational, and Steven D. Gish has captured both in his extraordinary recounting of Biehl's journey. While some may struggle to fathom why this young white scholar chose to walk alongside South Africans on their often-dangerous path to democracy, Gish’s masterful book provides answers in her own words and those of others who understood her passion and her commitment. Amy Biehl’s Last Home is a book that can and should inspire us all.”
Charlayne Hunter-Gault, author and longtime African affairs journalist
“I knew both the author and the subject of this book from a Stanford class in African politics. As a black South African, I had considerable anti-white grievance, but Steve and Amy in their life choices laid bare the dangers of my single story, even more so when Amy died so tragically in my hometown. As race relations seem to be unraveling on both sides of the Atlantic, this impressive work of scholarship about the entangled histories of South Africa and the United States comes at an opportune time.”
Jonathan Jansen, Distinguished Professor, University of Stellenbosch
“Readers interested in reconciliation processes and justice movements will find this study illuminating and moving.”
Publishers Weekly
“Amy Biehl’s Last Home will, for all its accessibility to a general readership, be of value to scholars of the South African transition, of the impact of South African events on the United States, and of what Gish calls ‘forgiveness studies.’”
Christopher Saunders, University of Cape Town
In 1993, white American Fulbright scholar Amy Biehl was killed in a racially motivated attack near Cape Town, after spending months working to promote democracy and women’s rights in South Africa. The ironic circumstances of her death generated enormous international publicity and yielded one of South Africa’s most heralded stories of postapartheid reconciliation. Amy’s parents not only established a humanitarian foundation to serve the black township where she was killed, but supported amnesty for her killers and hired two of the young men to work for the Amy Biehl Foundation. The Biehls were hailed as heroes by Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, and many others in South Africa and the United States—but their path toward healing was neither quick nor easy.
Granted unrestricted access to the Biehl family’s papers, Steven Gish brings Amy and the Foundation to life in ways that have eluded previous authors. He is the first to place Biehl’s story in its full historical context, while also presenting a gripping portrait of this remarkable young woman and the aftermath of her death across two continents.
Steven D. Gish is a professor of history at Auburn University at Montgomery. His previous books include Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African and Desmond Tutu: A Biography. He has traveled widely in South Africa since the 1980s and has interviewed key figures in the antiapartheid movement, including Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Desmond Tutu, Trevor Huddleston, and Beyers Naudé.
FEATURED
Interview with Steven D. Gish, author of Amy Biehl's Last Home
Orange County Register interview with Gish
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RELATED SUBJECTS
Biography, Women · African History · South Africa · African Studies
FORMATS
Hardcover
978-0-8214-2321-9
Retail price: $28.95, T.
Release date: June 2018
61 illus. · 392 pages · 6 × 9 in.
Rights: World
Electronic
978-0-8214-4634-8
Release date: June 2018
61 illus. · 392 pages
Rights: World
ADDITIONAL PRAISE FOR AMY BIEHL’S LAST HOME
“Gish brings new insights to the story of Amy Biehl, her death, and the family's coming to peace with the tragedy … His knowledge as an historian of modern South Africa gives nuance and depth to this inspiring story of commitment, sacrifice, and forgiveness.”
John Hennessy, President, Stanford University, 2000–2016
“Steven Gish has written a remarkable account of Amy Biehl’s life, death, and what happened subsequently as her killers were brought to trial and her parents established a foundation in her name devoted to reconciliation and forgiveness. Deftly probing the controversies that erupted in South Africa after her death and the work of the foundation, Gish sensitively plumbs the pathos that is at the heart of the story. There were passages where I was brought to tears.”
Robert R. Edgar, coauthor of African Apocalypse: The Story of Nontetha Nkwenkwe, a Twentieth-Century South African Prophet
RELATED TITLES
How American 'Sister' Died in a Township
By BILL KELLER
It was daylight still when Amy Elizabeth Biehl steered her old orange Mazda with the peace sticker on the bumper into the black township of Guguletu. She knew the place and its people well, or thought she did.
Her work as a Fulbright scholar was finished, her bags packed for a Friday flight home to California, and now she was driving three black friends home for the last time. At her farewell party on Sunday, she had switched easily between English and her hard-studied Xhosa, and danced the phan tsula, a sort of township jive.
"That's how much she fitted in here," said Melanie Jacobs, the black woman who shared a house with Miss Biehl in Cape Town. "She loved Africa. She wasn't just another white person." 'Kill the Settler!'
And yet the 26-year-old scholar was exactly that to the furious mob of young Guguletu men who stopped the Mazda with a brick through the windshield. Yelling "Kill the settler!" they chased her down before she could reach the sanctuary of a filling station and, as she pleaded for mercy, stabbed at her head until she died.
The death on Wednesday of Amy Biehl, believed to be the first American killed in South Africa's relentless political violence, stunned her friends and horrified South Africa's large American population, much of it, like Miss Biehl, devoted to hastening South African democracy.
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But unlike so many of the daily deaths racked up in South Africa's political tumult, in which motive and blame are matters of conjecture, Amy Biehl's was remarkably unmysterious.
She was killed, her roommate said mournfully, "because she was white."
Police today arrested two teen-age suspects, student members of a militant black nationalist group, the Pan-Africanist Congress, whose slogan is "One settler, one bullet." Mainstream black leaders deplore the slogan, but for many young blacks the idea of a war on whites is a thrilling outlet for volcanic frustration and resentment.
In recent months many young blacks have applauded sporadic massacres of whites at church, at play and at home, all rationalized as a sample of what blacks endure. The hatred makes no distinction between oppressors and idealists, settlers and foreigners.
Tsietsi Telite, chairman of the Pan-Africanist student wing, coolly accepted the killing, telling reporters today, "Given the situation on the ground, the youths and students are so angry and frustrated that when they see someone who they identify with the dispossessing classes, anything can happen, and could happen again."
More than 10,000 Americans live in South Africa. Scores, perhaps hundreds, have been drawn to the townships as scholars, voter-education aides and relief workers, excited by the chance to help South Africa complete its transition from apartheid to democracy.
Miss Biehl, a 1989 graduate of Stanford University, came first in 1991 to work on voter education, her roommate said. She returned 10 months ago to study women's status in South Africa, and was soon absorbed in volunteer projects.
"She was to be found in the townships almost every day or night," said Dullah Omar, director of the Community Law Center at the University of the Western Cape, where Miss Biehl helped with legal research for the African National Congress.
The townships of the Cape are not notorious for their violence, in part because there are comparatively few followers of the Zulu-based Inkatha Freedom Party, which has been a protagonist in township warfare elsewhere. But the Cape townships have a strong Pan-Africanist following and a low tolerance for dissenting views. Edgy Over Teachers' Strike
This week the townships have been restive because of a nationwide strike by black teachers that has sharply divided blacks and left youngsters with nothing to do.
Singiswa Bevu, one of the women Miss Biehl was driving home, said scores of young men converged on the car, first chanting Pan-Africanist slogans, then bombarding the car with stones. She was stabbed in the hand trying to defend her friend.
Some Americans said Miss Biehl's killing, however extraordinary, would damp the enthusiasm of American volunteers just when they are badly needed to help prepare for next April's elections.
"If I were an American thinking about coming over here now, I'd be having second thoughts," said a woman who monitors corporate social programs in black communities.
But another American woman who works daily in Alexandra, a black township adjoining Johannesburg, said: "I don't feel any more threatened than I ever have. It's very racist to think that my life is worth any more than anyone else's."
In Cape Town, the killing of the popular scholar has stirred a black backlash against the militant groups that stoke hatred for whites.
The African National Congress offered its township network to help identify the killers. Friends and colleagues, after memorializing Miss Biehl with freedom hymns and African laments, paraded through Guguletu with placards declaring, "Comrades Come in All Colors."
Melanie Jacobs told those assembled at the memorial service: "I want to say to people that you have killed your own sister."
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A version of this article appears in print on August 27, 1993, on Page A00001 of the National edition with the headline: How American 'Sister' Died in a Township. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe