Posted on May 6, 2015 · Posted in Faculty Associates News

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

(Washington, D.C. | May 5, 2015) Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights is pleased to announce a new partnership with Larry Shore, Professor of Film and Media Studies at Hunter College, producer and co-director of the documentary film RFK in the Land of Apartheid: A Ripple of Hope. The partnership will allow RFK Human Rights to use Larry’s film for educational and fundraising purposes. The DVD will be available for purchase. Details to follow.

“Larry Shore’s film is a moving and powerful depiction of one of the most courageous chapters in my father’s career,” said Kerry Kennedy, President of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights. “Robert Kennedy was so strongly opposed to Apartheid, and he welcomed the opportunity to visit South Africa in 1966 and stand with those working to end it. We are so grateful to Larry for this partnership, and we look forward to sharing this important film through our network.”

Larry Shore said, “I am very pleased at the opportunity to partner with RFK Human Rights to make it possible for new audiences, and especially students, to have the opportunity to learn the story of this important visit and its impact which still resonates today as we approach the 50th anniversary.

The film has been broadcast on PBS, the South African Broadcasting Corporation, the Africa Channel and Al-Jazeera as well as numerous institutions, universities and film festivals in the US and South Africa including the JFK Presidential Library and the RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights. The film recounts Robert F. Kennedy’s visit to South Africa in 1966, when he was a Senator from New York. Accompanied by his wife, Ethel, the founder of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Senator Kennedy witnessed the harsh regime of Apartheid firsthand, giving hope to the beleaguered opponents of the government—black and white alike—that their peaceful promotion of justice and democracy would one day win out. He met with numerous South Africans including the banned President of the ANC and Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Chief Albert Luthuli.

In a letter to Dr. Shore, Ethel Kennedy wrote, “It was a time of courage: Bobby, the students willing to speak out at great risk, Chief Luthuli, banished, but not silenced, journalists who saw the truth and bravely printed it, and the oppressed, deprived citizens of Soweto whose daily lives were a witness to man’s inhumanity…thank you for bringing the history, the hope and the healing to like. The film is a gem”

It was during this trip that Senator Kennedy delivered the Day of Affirmation Address at the University of Cape Town, featuring one of his most indelible quotes: “It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

President Obama quoted these words when he gave a speech in the same hall at the University of Cape Town in June 2013.