Honouring Es’kia Mphahlele as a timeless prophet and social critic

Delivering the 16th Es’kia Mphahlele Annual Memorial Lecture in Polokwane on Wednesday, 26 November 2025, with the theme “The African Writer as a Prophet and Social Critic in Contemporary Times”, Professor Műkoma wa Ngũgĩ, acclaimed scholar, author and poet, said that Mphahlele and his contemporaries were not only conscious of each other and immersed in their political and cultural context, but also influenced Black Americans and the Black diaspora across the world.

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The annual lecture honours the legacy of writer, educator, artist, and activist Professor Es’kia Mphahlele to acknowledge his contributions to literary discourse, promote academic intellectualism, and advance Unisa’s social impact through teaching and learning, critical research, and engaged scholarship.

In her welcome address, Professor Puleng LenkaBula, the Principal and Vice-Chancellor (VC) of Unisa, said that it is often forgotten that Mphahlele was a global citizen. “It is essential for us as a university and as a country never to reduce his legacy only to the village that he came from,” she said. “It is essential not to lock him just in his ethnicity nor in his village, because he actually lived around the world, making sure that the best of Africa's knowledge, its literature, and its critical analyses are respected globally. So let us allow him to flourish and to become the global icon that he should be.”