Proud Mom Angelina Jolie Praises Daughter Zahara As ‘Extraordinary African Woman’

The actor and activist recently shed light on her parenting approach, explaining that she leads with openness and honesty when discussing adoption with her children.

“With my adopted children, I can’t speak of pregnancy, but I speak with much detail and love about the journey to find them and what it was like to look in their eyes for the first time,” she told Vogue India in June, adding that “adoption and orphanage are positive words in our home.”

“All adopted children come with a beautiful mystery of a world that is meeting yours. When they are from another race and foreign land, that mystery, that gift, is so full,” she continued. “For them, they must never lose touch with where they came from. They have roots that you do not. Honor them. Learn from them. It’s the most amazing journey to share. They are not entering your world, you are entering each other’s worlds.”

Jolie’s rare comment about Zahara came up during a discussion about climate justice and racism with Nakate, who was cropped out of a photo with Greta Thunberg and three other white climate activists earlier this year.

In response to the ongoing nationwide protests against police brutality, Jolie, who has spent much of her life advocating for the rights of refugees abroad, said she has shifted her focus to combating systemic racism at home. 

“A system that protects me but might not protect my daughter — or any other man, woman or child in our country based on skin color — is intolerable,” she told Harper’s Bazaar in June, adding that the government must enact ”laws and policies that actually address structural racism and impunity.”

Ahead of her 45th birthday, the actor and activist donated $200,000 to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to “address the deep structural wrongs in our society.”