Making the Road by Walking:
Tours to Africa with Prexy Nesbitt

Prexy Nesbitt is an educator, activist and scholar – these are intertwined activities; activities that are in dialogue in Prexy’s life and work whether in the classroom, taking educational groups to Southern Africa, in his various publications or his commitment to creating archives from the material he has collected and produced over the years.

Prexy consistently puts not only education and political activism in dialogue but he puts the US and Africa in conversation. ... Central to all of the conversations Prexy creates and to his work is a commitment to anti-racism. Whether he is organizing on the West side of Chicago with MLK, Jr. in the 1960s; helping direct the World Council of Churches Program to Combat Racism in the late 1970s from Geneva, Switzerland; serving as a program officer for the MacArthur Foundation in the 1990s and as a special aide to Chicago Mayor Harold Washington; as the Dean of Students and Dean of Community Engagement and Diversity at the prestigious Francis W. Parker school in Chicago; as an African history professor at Columbia College in Chicago; or sitting around the dinner table with friends.

Excerpted from introduction of Prexy by Marissa Moorman, when he spoke at an Indiana University African Studies Program at the Unitarian Church in Bloomington, March 25, 2009.

For an interview with more background, see http://www.noeasyvictories.org/interviews/int08_nesbitt.php

See more about Prexy, including how to contact him for speaking engagements or tours, on http://prexynesbitt.com.

Tour Testimonials

Diane Sampson, San Francisco Playwright (traveled to South Africa, Namibia, and Mozambique with Prexy in 2008)

Traveling to Africa with Prexy is like having the curtain lifted on a world that was previously unknown. The stereotypes fall away and you are confronted with a complex scene that startles and fascinates, upsets and inspires. No “tourist” trip this, but an in-depth look at a living, breathing work in progress, and Prexy, with his voluminous knowledge and on-the-ground experience is the perfect man to serve as your guide.

Darchelle M. Garner, Vice President, Project Development The CHEST Foundation

The trip was thoughtful and well-organized in every way, from the pre-trip orientation to the meetings with key people in Southern Africa. Participants’ special interests were addressed and incorporated into everything we did, which ensured an exceptionally meaningful experience for everyone. A particularly great aspect of the trip was the diversity of age among participants and the clear commitment to Africa that each seemed to possess.

Ms.Rubina Diggs, a Chicago educator

The Making the Road Trip was an experience that I have never had in my young 30 years. I met people that I’d never imagined meeting, I’d seen things that I never thought I’d see. ... I was there forming friendships that would have otherwise been nonexistent hadn’t it been for this voyage to finding myself and my role in this world. I do not see things or people regardless of race, class or gender in the same way in which I once did.