Column: Valuing humanity key to changing world

Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu.It is a Zulu phrase that I picked up while studying abroad in South Africa, and it represents a concept that I believe can bring new life and greater beauty to our world. Africans claim the phrase is difficult to translate into Western language, but Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu tries his best when he explains it as, "My humanity is caught up, is inextricably bound up, in what is yours." Another South African explains, "I am because you are, and you are because we are." It means your joys are my joys and your suffering is my suffering. It means until there is peace in the world, there cannot fully be peace in my heart.