Sara Baartman, also known as "The Hottentot Venus," was a young Khoi Khoi woman taken from her home in South Africa to be crudely prodded and exhibited as a sideshow attraction in Britain in the early 1800's. Her life is the subject of a new book, "African Queen: The Real Life of the Hottentot Venus" by Rachel Holmes just released by Random House. Caroline Elkins, the Hugo K. Foster associate professor of African studies at Harvard, reviewed the book in this Sunday's New York Times noting, "The story of Saartjie Baartman — the Hottentot Venus’s real name — is inherently fascinating, and littered with a diverse cast of highly unlikable characters."

Learn more about Baartman in Zola Maseko's multiple award-winning doc, THE LIFE AND TIMES OF SARA BAARTMAN. Called "telling and quite powerful" by the American Historical Review, the film explores Baartman's life and the legacy of racism and sexism her exploitation represented, which lived on for over a century after her death. And following up the first film, Maseko returned to Baartman’s story when French senator Nicolas About introduced a law to repatriate Baartman’s remains to South Africa chronicled in THE RETURN OF SARA BAARTMAN.

Labels: Baartman, history, Hottentot Venus, South Africa, women's issues