CROSSROADS: I live where I like, a graphic history, foreword by Robin D.G. Kelley
146pp., colour illus., paperback, Johannesburg, 2022
An illustrated history of women-led movements at the forefront of the struggle for land, housing and public services over the past 50 years. Drawing on over 60 life narratives, it focuses on the women who successfully resisted the apartheid government’s planned destruction of Crossroads, an informal settlement outside Cape Town, during the 1970s.
"This is the story of how the women of Crossroads fought for the basic human right to occupy space in the country of their birth - build homes for themselves and their families; build a community. Meet the brave women who defied the indomitable, ruthless, murderous/ callous government and hear what they suffered, not only at the hands of the oppressor but also internally, from those they had every right to consider 'colleagues' or fellow sufferers who ought to have been on their side. Hear how they persisted despite formidable odds. " Sindiwe Magona, author of When the Village Sleeps, To My Children's Children and Mother to Mother “
"Koni Benson and her colleagues have produced an excellent and colourful history of the people of Crossroads. Based on original scholarly research, the comic books bring to life the tribulations and resistance of poor black people, especially women, in the face of constant state violence. Their determination to organise and to struggle for the right to a decent life in Cape Town, whose authorities were determined to exclude them from the city, hold crucial lessons for contemporary movements of the poor and marginalised. The Crossroads comic books are a fine example of popular history and should be compulsory reading in our schools and communities.” Noor Nieftagodien, author of The Soweto Uprising and Alexandra: A history
Koni Benson is a lecturer in the Department of History at the University of the Western Cape. This book is based on her PhD thesis.
Writer, illustrator, and translator André Trantraal is the author of the comic books Coloureds and Stormkaap. His political cartoons have appeared in various South African newspapers.
Poet, cartoonist, translator, playwright, screenwriter, short story author, and columnist Nathan Trantraal was awarded the 2015 Ingrid Jonker Prize for his first collection of poems, Chokers en Survivors. His comics have been published in various South African newspapers. He is currently a lecturer at the School of Languages at Rhodes University.
Comic book artist, designer, and painter Ashley E. Marais, with the Trantraal Brothers, is co-author and illustrator on the graphic novel Stormkaap and the comic book Coloureds. Also with the Trantraal Brothers, he is joint illustrator of Safety, Justice & People’s Power, a book on the Khayelitsha Commission written by Richard Conyngham.
American academic Robin D.G. Kelley is the Gary B. Nash Professor of American History at UCLA. His books include Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination; Race Rebels: Culture, Politics and the Black Working Class, and Imagining Home: Class, Culture, and Nationalism in the African Diaspora.