Gcina Mhlope

• Name — Dr.Gcina Mhlophe • Birth Name — Nokugcina Elsie Mhlophe • Relatives — Sindiwe Magona • Born — 24 October 1958 • Birthplace — KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa • Occupation — * anti-apartheid activist • actress • storyteller • poet • playwright • director • author • Years Active — 1988–present • Notable Works — Black Dog: Inj'emnyama • Website — https: www.gcinamhlophe.co.za/

Nokugcina Elsie Mhlophe was born on 24 October 1958 in Hammarsdale, KwaZulu-Natal, to a Xhosa mother and a Zulu father. Gcina's father worked at an oil company in Jacobs, South Durban basin, while her mother worked as a domestic worker. Born out of wedlock, she was separated from her mother at the age of 2, and went to live with her father, who was married with 8 children. She started her working life as a domestic worker, and did not visit a library until she was 20 years old.

Mhlophe worked as a newsreader at the Press Trust and BBC Radio. From 1982-1983, she was a writer for the "Learn and Teach" magazine. She began to get a sense of the demand for stories while in Chicago in 1988. She performed at a library in a mostly-Black neighborhood, where an ever-growing audience kept inviting her back. Still, Mhlophe only began to think of storytelling as a career after meeting an Imbongi, one of the legendary poets of African folklore, and after encouragement by Mannie Manim, the then-director of the Market Theatre, Johannesburg. From 1989 to 1990, she was resident director at the Market Theatre. Mhlophe has appeared in theatres from Soweto to London, and much of her work has been translated into German, French, Italian, Swahili, and Japanese. She has travelled extensively in Africa and other parts of the world giving storytelling workshops. Mhlophe's stories meld folklore, information, current affairs, song, and idiom. Storytelling is a deeply traditional activity in South Africa, and Mhlophe is one of the few woman storytellers in a country dominated by males. She does her work through charismatic performances, working to preserve storytelling as a means of keeping history alive and encouraging South African children to read. She tells her stories in four of South Africa's languages: English, Afrikaans, Zulu and Xhosa. Her writing has appeared in collections including A Land Apart: A South African Reader (eds André Brink and J. M. Coetzee, London: Faber and Faber, 1986), Daughters of Africa (ed. Margaret Busby, London: Jonatan Cape, 1992) and Women Writing Africa: The Southern Region (ed. Margaret Daymond, Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press, 2002).

• 1983, lead role in Umongikazi: The Nurse, by Maishe Maponya • 1984, in Black Dog: Inj'emnyama • 1986, Place of Weeping (film) • 1986, Have You Seen Zandile? (autobiographical play, at the Market Theatre, Johannesburg, Mhlophe as Zandile) • 1987, Born in the RSA (New York) • 1989, storytelling festival at the Market Theatre • 1989, performed a poem in honor of Albert Luthuli, 1960 Nobel Peace Prize winner • 1990, performed Have You Seen Zandile? at the Edinburgh Festival tour through Europe and the USA • 1997, Poetry Africa, presenting poet • 1999, guest speaker at the Perth Writers Festival • 2000, performed in Peter und der Wolf at the Komische Oper (Berlin) • 2002, The Bones of Memory (performance, history-telling from the old and new South Africa) • 2003, lectured on storytelling at the Eye of the Beholder seminar • 2003, Mata Mata (performance, family musical) • 2006, FIFA World Cup South African handover ceremony, Germany • 2016, Kalushi (film) • 2017, Liyana, a multimedia film by Aaron Kopp

• Acted and narrated in Travelling Songs • 1990, performed poetry in Songololo: Voices of Change (how aspects of culture in South Africa have become part of the anti-apartheid struggle) • 1993, The Travelling Song (the contemporary process of story gathering) • Appeared in Literacy Alive • Appeared in Art Works

• Pops Mohamed, musician and tribal music preservationist • Ladysmith Black Mambazo, choir group, The Gift of the Tortoise (CD), 1994 and Music for Little People in America (CD), 1993 • Anant Singh, video producer, Fudukazi's Magic (CD and video for German audiences)

* • Badilisha Poetry Exchange Profile and podcast