Letters to My Children: Tweets to Make You Think

By Jonathan Jansen

It started as advice to his own two children entering adulthood, it spread to his students at the University of the Free State and now tens of thousands of his followers of Twitter and Facebook wait for Jonathan Jansen's words of wisdom every day. Each day Jansen (@JJ_UFS) writes a Letter to my children -- a nugget of advice on life, love and becoming a compassionate, thinking human being. Jansen has become South Africa's moral barometer in a time when leadership seems to be sorely lacking in many areas of our country which explains why this project has struck such a chord with South Africans young and old alike. Jansen talks to young people using new media but continues to give them good old fashioned advice about how to conduct their lives as strong and caring citizens who live life to the fullest. In this book, Jansen explains his thinking behind his wildly popular Twitter campaign and shares the first 160 Tweets with his readers. The Tweets range in subject from politics, to love and relationships, to being a student and ensuring that you question the status quo. They include the following examples: condoms break; never under any circumstances become a politician; choose public service instead ; here is the secret to dealing with peer pressure--choose the right peers; go to university to screw-up; how else will you learn?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bookstorm
• Release date: Mar 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781920434700

Jonathan Jansen

Prof Jonathan Jansen is a leading South African educationist, commentator and the author of several books including the best-selling 'Letters to My Children'. He is the former vice-chancellor of the University of the Free State, where he earned a reputation for transformation and a deep commitment to reconciliation. He is married with two children.

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Introduction

Blame my favourite writer. You have not ‘felt’ writing unless you’ve read Maya Angelou, the great African-American author, poet and activist who wrote a famous book called I know why the caged bird sings. But it was her Letter to my daughter that really got my attention. As I read her letter I could not think of a greater gift to offer my own children than the life lessons I’ve learnt from hard experience. Now of course our parents (and other elders) leave all of us letters, so to speak, by which I mean those sayings we call to mind in later years in the form of ‘my mother always used to say that …’ or ‘my father’s favourite line was …’, and so