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I do not sing politics. I merely sing the truth.

Miriam Makeba

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Miriam Makeba
Age: 76 †
Born: 1932
Born: March 4
Died: 2008
Died: November 9
Actor
Recording Artist
Singer
Johannesburg
Gauteng
South Africa
Mama Africa
Zenzile Miriam Makeba
Miriam Zenzi Makeba
Zensile Makeba Qgwashu Nguvama Yiketheli Nxgowa Bantana Balomzi Xa Ufnu Ubajabulisa Ubaphekeli Mbiza Yotshwala Sithi Xa Saku Qgiba Ukutja Sithathe Izitsha Sizi Khabe Singama Lawu Singama Qgwashu Singama Nqamla Nqgithi
Mirjam Makeba
Sing
Merely
Politics
Truth

More quotes by Miriam Makeba

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You are damned and praised, or encouraged or discouraged by those who listen to you, and those who come to applaud you. And to me, those people are very important.
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Age is wisdom if one has lived ones life properly.
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[Belafonte]'d take me to perform for Martin Luther King's cause. But when they were marching I did not take part, because I was not a citizen
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I look at an ant and I see myself: a native South African, endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit.
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It's a really unfair world because life is, where I am all day long we listen to American music. So I don't see why the radios in the U.S. cannot even put aside one hour a day just to play music that is not American.
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I look at the past and I see myself.
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In New York I heard A Piece of Ground, written by a white South African, Jeremy Taylor. I modified it a little and sang it myself. That song is very special to me because it deals with the land question in southern Africa. We were dispossessed of our land.
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It was hard to be away from home, but I am glad that I am home now.
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If given a choice, I would have certainly selected to be what I am: one of the oppressed instead of one of the oppressors.
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I see other black women imitate my style, which is no style at all, but just letting our hair be itself. They call it the Afro Look.
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But if you are going to wear blinders then you do not know the world.
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And I believe that it becomes a troubled continent because there are those who must always cause confusion so that we do not keep these natural resources.
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For instance, we're always fighting amongst each other. Who gives us the arms? And then we become indebted to wherever we are buying them from - with what? The very resources we need to keep there.
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He [Belafonte] was a good teacher and looked after me. He said, 'You have such great talent, you must try not to be a tornado - be like a submarine. It was good advice when I found myself speaking at the UN Committee Against Apartheid and then the UN General Assembly.
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In the West the past is like a dead animal. It is a carcass picked at by the flies that call themselves historians and biographers. But in my culture the past lives. My people feel this way in part because death does not separate us from our ancestors.
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In those years, when I came to the States, people were always asking me why I didn't sing anymore. I'd tell them, 'I sing all around the world-Asia, Africa, Europe-but if you don't sing in the US, then you haven't really made it.' That's why I'll always be grateful to Paul Simon. He allowed me to bring my music back to my friends in this country.
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Belafonte sent his people to pick me up and I went back and shook his hand, then went back to my little flat. I was very happy to have met a president of the United States - little me!
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I didn't have much, but I was always happy to share what I did have. It seemed like every African that came to New York City would show up at my apartment door at dinnertime, and I couldn't turn them away. I wasn't much older than any of them, but they started calling me 'Mama Africa' and the name stuck.
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Be careful, think about the effect of what you say. Your words should be constructive, bring people together, not pull them apart.
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Girls are the future mothers of our society, and it is important that we focus on their well-being.
Miriam Makeba