Ekwueme Michael Thelwell

Ekwueme Michael Thelwell (born Michael Thelwell July 25, 1939) is an Jamaican novelist, essayist, professor and civil rights activist. He was in 1970 founding chairman of the Department of Afro-American Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Early life

Born Michael Miles Thelwell in Ulster Spring, Jamaica, he attended Jamaica College and subsequently worked as public relations assistant for the Jamaica Industrial Development Corporation (1958–59). In 1959 he moved to the United States, where he was educated at Howard University (earning a BA, 1964) and at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (MFA, 1969).

Activism

Thelwell was active in the Black Freedom Movement, the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), and in 1963 he was the Director of the Washington office of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). In the 1980s his anti-apartheid activism resulted in legislation enacting a law against corporate tax write-offs for US-based corporations paying taxes to the apartheid regime in South Africa.