United States of America Embassy to host Human Rights Activist, Elinor Sisulu

Topic: Educating Young African Women to Meet the Greatest Challenges Experienced by Older Generations

Harare, April 27, 2012: Writer and human rights activist Elinor Sisulu combines training in History, English Literature, Development Studies and Feminist Theory. She holds two degrees from the University of Zimbabwe and a diploma from the United Nations Institute for Economic Planning and Development (IDEP) in Dakar, Senegal.  She also holds an MA in Development Studies from the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague, Netherlands.

 Elinor worked at the Department of Research and Development in the Ministry of Labour in Zimbabwe, and published studies on women's work and development assistance. She contributed to a book entitled Women in Zimbabwe published by SAPES. She then worked for the International Labour Organization’s Lusaka Office from 1987 to 1990.

 From 1991 to 1998, she worked as a freelance writer and editor at SPEAK, a black feminist publication. In 1994, she wrote an award-winning children's book about the first democratic elections in South Africa entitled The Day Gogo Went to Vote. Her biography of her parents-in-law, Walter and Albertina Sisulu: In Our Lifetime, secured her the prestigious 2003 Noma Award for publishing in Africa. Time Warner Books published the book in the UK in 2003.

 Elinor has served as a judge for the Commonwealth Writer’s prize and chaired the Book Development Foundation associated with the Centre for the Book.  Her passion is children’s literature and she is a founding member of the Puku Children’s Literature Foundation.

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For more information, please contact Sharon Hudson-Dean, Counselor for Public Affairs, E-mail: HudsonDeanS@state.gov   Tel. +263 4 758800-1, Fax: 758802, cell +263 912 559 784