Lingering Effects of Apartheid: Human Rights Internship in South Africa

My oral presentation will be on the three weeks I spent in Cape Town, South Africa on a Law and Human Rights internship for my Klemm Fellowship. Cape Town has a high population of refugees that comes from neighboring countries, with many seeking asylums. In addition, South Africa has one of the highest rates of gender violence. For two weeks, I worked at the Projects Abroad Human Rights Office. Twice a week we went into different townships and provided pro-bono legal aid for the community members who cannot afford lawyers. In addition, we also visited detention centers for juveniles. On Monday we visited the female detention center which was broken up into the criminal girls and the care girls. On Wednesdays, we visited the male detention center which was broken into 4 categories and provided fun or education workshops to keep them engaged. The country's history with apartheid definitely has lingering effects that are witnessed when entering in different areas. On my time off, I hung out with my host family as well as the other volunteers and the supervisors as they showed me the best Cape Town has to offer.