Winnie Mandela (born 1936), South Africa's first black professional social welfare worker, chose service to needy people and devotion of her energy and skill to the struggle for equality and justice for all people in South Africa. After her marriage to Nelson Mandela in 1958 she suffered harassment, imprisonment, and periodic banishment for her continuing involvement in that struggle. In 1992, the marriage ended, but problems for Mandela continued.

The person the world knows as Winnie Mandela began life as Nomzamo ("she who strives," "she who has to undergo trials") Winifred (Winnie) Madikizela, daughter of Columbus and Gertrude Madikizela. Members of the Madikizela extended family were Xhosa-speaking people of the Pondo nation situated in what is today the so-called homeland nation of the Transkei. Both of her parents were mission-educated, English-speaking teachers: her father taught at the local eM-bongweni Primary School and represented Eastern Pondoland in the territorial council which arbitrated...