Hugh Masekela Quotes
What people don't know about oppression is that the oppressor works much harder. You always grew up being told you were not smart enough or not fast enough, but we all lived from the time we were children to beat the system.
Masekela, Hugh, and D. Michael Cheers. Still Grazing: The Musical Journey of Hugh Masekela. Crown Publishers, 2004.
Alexie, an American Indian, studied wrote about the phenomenon whereby the Indians who were brutalized and attacked by whites with modern weapons and other technological advantages, in the process of defending themselves and their way of life became oppressors to whites in many situations where they could dominate a local scene. Likewise, the Israelis, who were totally oppressed in the Middle East for years and dominated by the more numerous Arabs with over a dozen established national armies attacking the Jewish civilian population when Israel first became a state. However the Jews survived and each time the Arabs attacked and further oppressed the Israelis, the Jews became stronger until at some point the became oppressors of many of the Arabs. The oppressors became the oppressed and vica versa.
Hugh Ramapolo Masekela was a South African trumpeter, flugelhornist, cornetist, singer and composer who was described as "the father of South African jazz". Masekela was known for his jazz compositions and for writing well-known anti-apartheid songs such as "Soweto Blues" and "Bring Him Back Home". He also had a number-one US pop hit in 1968 with his version of "Grazing in the Grass".
