Mandela’s legacy honored after death

The group of students stood in silence at Wilkie Auditorium, remembering the late international icon of freedom and equality.

In honor of Nelson Mandela’s death Thursday, the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity paused its Crossover Step Show Thursday night to take a moment of silence.

The former South African president, who spent 27 years in prison fighting for an end to apartheid, died Thursday at the age of 95, according to The Associated Press.

He was “an inspirational leader dedicated to his cause,” junior and fraternity member Dominique White said to the audience of about 400 students. “He deserves our respect.”

Earlier in the evening, Eric Love, director of the Office of Diversity Education, was in his office with a student employee when he heard the news of Mandela’s death.

“We didn’t talk to each other but we just independently started crying,” Love said. “He represented the absolute best of humanity. His capacity for recognition and forgiveness ... it’s just so rare.”

Mandela became a symbol of freedom for the way he sacrificed decades in prison before ending the white majority rule in South Africa. But Love said Mandela will be most remembered for the way he initiated social change — not by seeking revenge with the parties who imprisoned him, but by showing forgiveness to move the nation forward.

“He became a symbol around the world for peace and justice and democracy, but also for forgiveness and love,” Love said.  

As news of Mandela’s death emerged, politicians on the state and federal level expressed words of admiration for his leadership and bravery.

“As a promoter of freedom and a voice for the victims of injustice, Nelson Mandela’s contributions to the world will keep his memory alive,” Sen. Dan Coats, R-Ind., said in a tweet.

President Barack Obama called Mandela “a man who took history in his hands and bent the arc of the moral universe towards justice.”

There are about 150 to 170 IU alumni in South Africa, Associate Vice President of IU Communications Mark Land said.

IU President Michael McRobbie formally launched the University’s first alumni chapter in the nation in September during a week-long stay in Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa. He also signed an agreement between the Kelley School of Business and University of Pretoria’s Gordon Institute of Business Science.

During his trip, McRobbie visited the jail cell where Mandela was imprisoned in Robben Island, an island about three miles west off the coast of Cape Town.

Samuel Obeng, director of the African Studies Program at IU, said in an email the department’s condolences to the people of South Africa.

“A hero to many, a larger than life person, a symbol of freedom, and a father of the New South African nation, Mr. Mandela, one of the greatest humans who ever lived in the 20th and 21st Centuries, gave hope to many and inspired people, the world over, to reach for the heights and to love one another,” he said in the email.

Alex Lichtenstein, an IU associate professor of history, has focused researched on the trade union movements aligned with apartheid, “the movement that Mandela supported and that supported Mandela as well.”

He has curated an exhibition on display at the Mathers Museum of World Cultures since Sept. 6 of rarely-seen Life magazine photographs from the early days of apartheid.

“He combined so many different strands of movements of the 20th century,”  Lichtenstein said. “All of these things he was able to draw together in the name of freedom.”

Many members of Lichenstein’s generation remember their time in college in the 1980s, in the midst of the anti-apartheid movement and Mandela’s time in jail.  

“What was the great issue of the day?” Lichenstein said. “It was anti-apartheid. It was ‘free Nelson Mandela.’”

Lichenstein said although there will be deep mourning in South Africa and worldwide, the South African people have prepared for this day.

“Internationally it will be an excellent opportunity for people to think about the legacy of the anti-apartheid movement,” Lichenstein said.

Lichenstein’s exhibition will remain on display for two more weeks before being moved to museums in Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa.  

A Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Mandela preferred not to think about the past, but rather the future, Obeng said in his email.

“He taught us a lesson on love and even though he was the core of a steel, he was humble and dignified,” Obeng said. “He believed that society could accomplish much more with dignity and grace. His life was illustrative of resilience, integrity, and principle.”

Follow reporter Samantha Schmidt on Twitter @schmidtsam7.