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(Note:  , professor of sociology and Africana and Latin American studies, delivered these remarks December 12 at a celebration of the life of Nelson Mandela.)

I would like, on behalf of ALST, the program in Africana and Latin American studies, and its director, Professor Brian Moore, to welcome you to this gathering.

We are here today to celebrate the life of Nelson Rolihlhla Mandela. He was known to South Africans by his clan name Madiba.

Though I think a number of us may shed a tear, we emphasize celebration. South Africans have literally been dancing in the streets over the last week. They know that Mandela in his 95 years has lived a life which, hard as it was, was fuller than any other. Ultimately, he redeemed his country and gave great gifts to the whole world.

Madiba’s international impact has been extraordinary. Over the last week people all over the world have been putting forward their own versions of him. And that is in a way to be welcomed; it is wonderful that so many can draw inspiration from one man.

I realized that like everyone else I had my own version of Mandela.

By way of an introduction I have decided to offer you just my own thoughts and feelings on why I, personally, celebrate this great man.

I celebrate my own memories of Madiba.

At the FNB Stadium in Johannesburg in 1990 watching him come out into the sunshine, just a few days after he had been released, surrounded by his old comrades, while ancient jazzmen played the swing music of his youth.

At his inauguration as president at the Union Buildings in 1994, when we in the crowd below could only see him on the giant video screen , when the planes flew past and hope was limitless.

At a Johannesburg synagogue in the mid 1990s, when the warmth of his presence filled the room and won over the audience.

I celebrate Madiba, who dreamed of a different world

Who was born a subject of the Empire on which the sun never set, and saw the sun set on it.

Who constantly believed in the apparently impossible task of ending a mighty tyranny, and who brought that tyranny to its knees.

Whose life tells us never to listen when we are told that a world more just is impossible.

I celebrate Madiba the young leader

Speaking at meetings, handsome in his greatcoat on Joburg town hall steps.

The man of rallies at Freedom Square, Sophiatown, where the houses would be demolished and the people driven away in trucks.

Leading the boycotts, burning his pass in a little metal pot.

Madiba in the cage at Joburg Drill Hall, cheerfully facing four years of the treason trial.

I celebrate the courage of Madiba who took up arms.

His rag-tag army against a military power.

The home made bombs bringing down power pylons.

His struggle to subject the methods of war to an ethical accounting and his commitment to protect civilians.

His clandestine journeys through Africa and his underground life.

His calm willingness to face death.

I celebate Madiba the prisoner.

Who led the convicts.

Who confronted and faced down intransigent warders.

And made friendships with others.

Who exercised every day in his cell.

Who studied in the University of Robben Island.

Who looked across the cold waters of the Bay toward Table Mountain

I celebrate the Madiba who loved the land

The small boy, a cattle herd growing up in the green lands where, as the poet says, the road runs down to the sea and the hills are lovely beyond all the singing of it.

Who talked in his inaugural address of how South Africans are united by their love of the land.

In words that even now make me think of yellow grass rustling in the thin wind under a pale sky.

I celebrate Madiba who made the peace

Not by weakness but by unbreakable strength.

Who started negotiations from prison despite the opposition of many of his friends.

Who recognized the humanity of his opponent and won them over but never bending his principles.

I celebrate Mandela the Organizer

The most innovative of leaders, who always talked of himself as a member of a movement, of an organization.

Who led the chant at meetings: Amandla! (Power) and the crowd would respond Ngawehtu (It is ours).

Who constantly taught us even the greatest leader cannot change things on his own.

Who was a man for the trade unions, for the community organisations, for the student movements, for the cultural groups. Who came to recognize that there lay the force that would bring down the regime.

And whose life reminds us that here and now, in this apparently unchanging world that the power to change things is ours, when and if people come together.

I celebrate Madiba the light hearted.

The young man about town of the 1940s who bought himself a fine suit and an Oldsmobile and went to the clubs.

The young boxer posing in his gloves and shorts on a rooftop against the Johannesburg skyline

The man who who told Johnny Clegg “music and dancing make me at peace with myself”.

The elder statesman who enjoyed meeting rock stars and movie stars and footballers and told the band Spice Girls that they were his inspiration.

Who loved children and found happiness in his old age with Graca

I celebrate the Madiba who discomforts the political consensus of the north.

Madiba many of whose closest allies and friends were Communists.

Madiba who in his trial speech imagined a classless society

Madiba the friend of Fidel Castro, who supported his struggle.

The Madiba who stood against the Iraq War.

I celebrate the Madiba who built a new country

Madiba in a green Springbok Rugby jersey cheered by a huge white crowd at Ellis Park.

Madiba struggling, sometimes failing, but always struggling to bring a better life to the poor.

Madiba fighting his own party for the proper care of those with HIV.

I celebrate the Madiba who disrupts our complacency.

He does not stand for a story that is over, but for many stories that are yet to begin.

His memory reminds us that South Africa is still a land of great poverty and the task is incomplete.

Whose whole life exposes the corruption of the present South African leaders.

Whose universal messages is that poverty, inequality and exclusion is everywhere and that we should act as we can to oppose it. Even if we are not heroes.

Who teaches us that always that task is in front of us and before us, whether in the townships of South Africa or in the woods of upstate new York

Madiba whose life tells us that it is up to us whether we accept our world or we act in it .

The power is, indeed, ours.

Hamba Kahle, Madiba. Go well Madiba. May we be deserving of your great legacy.