The Dedman College Interdisciplinary Institute invites you to a lecture by Dr. Jill Kelly, Associate Professor of History and Altshuler Distinguished Teaching Professor at SMU, marking the 70th anniversary of the South African Treason Trial. This is the third event in the 2026 Godbey Lecture Series.

70 years ago, South African police arrested Dr. Zamindlela Conco, Nelson Mandela, and over one-hundred other leaders of the Congress Alliance. Between 1956 and 1961, in what infamously became known as the "Treason Trial," the apartheid state struggled to prove that the accused advocated for a hostile overthrow of the government. The defense skillfully undermined the charges with testimony from the soft-spoken Zulu doctor, devout Christian, and anti-apartheid activist, Dr. Conco. His testimony and trial diary reveal the diverse dreams and motivations of those fighting to end apartheid.

Jill E. Kelly is a historian of South Africa. She is Associate Professor of History and Altshuler Distinguished Teaching Professor at SMU and Research Associate at the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study. She is the author of To Swim with Crocodiles: Land, Authority, and Belonging in South Africa, 1800-1996 (Michigan State University Press and University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2018) and No Ordinary Letter:  A Gendered History of Rural Violence in Apartheid South Africa (forthcoming with Ohio University Press). Her work has been supported by an American Council of Learned Societies fellowship, the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Abroad fellowship, and a Fulbright Scholar Award. Her articles have been recognized by the American Historical Association and the Coordinating Council of Women in History.