Dear friends,

My name is Shane Lentoor. I was born in 1981 in an old Colonial fishing village on the banks of the Eastern Cape of South Africa that exposed me to prejudice and discrimination based on class, gender, and race position in society. My experience of living under these conditions (early deconstruction days of the apartheid system) gave me insight into my position in relation to the structural characteristics of the various forms of discrimination. This had a direct impact on my emotional and spiritual upbringing.  At the age of 12 years, I frequently traveled between Cape Town and East London. Being the eldest of 6 children, my parents did not have the means to look after all of us.  At the age of 17, I matriculated as a volunteer community development worker, leader of a youth movement and a full-time performing arts student and yet I was considered inferior in my country of origin and birth.

I have always seen myself as a thinking and doing person and I generally consider myself a humanist. Traveling between Cape Town and East London I had the opportunity to see the spaces or tones in between. I found it extremely disappointing and disturbing to discover the social exclusion of my kind from service delivery to education and working opportunities. I discovered my activist persona at a young age and realized at a young age that things need to change. I volunteered at community organizations, debated in public spaces, worked in prisons, hospitals, and schools, and witnessed the same structural inequalities and the impacts they have on the minds and beings of the most affected, the marginalized. I feel the need to deconstruct that inherited belief.

I became engrossed with the idea of deconstruction but did not actually understand the depth of the ideologies that controlled my life.  The reality of not being born with a ‘proverbial silver spoon’ soon became a reality when I realized I have to fight for everything I need. I volunteered to broaden and deepen my understanding of inequality and unjust systems. I could not afford to attend university but provided for my siblings and parents by doing odd jobs like pushing scrap and working as a gardener or vegetable seller. I enrolled in small courses and read widely, educated myself, and finally enrolled at UNISA for a Generalist Bachelor of Arts Degree. My paradigm is to support society to a point of self-actualization towards social and public agency to influence positive change. 

I created Silent Knowledge in order to support children growing up in the complicated social landscape of Lavender Hill, Cape Town, where the culture and cycle of gangsterism are prevalent and difficult to escape. I value self-reflection, nature, and family connection. The Silent Knowledge program aims to rekindle children’s relationships with these fundamental virtues and to give them the tools to unlearn societal conditioning and to navigate successfully the complex system of Non-Governmental Organizations in the area.

With Love,