No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

This thesis is an in-depth study of Shona fiction about the liberation war in Zimbabwe. It looks at the way Zimbabwe’s liberation war is portrayed in Shona fiction and focuses on the factors that shaped writers’ perspectives on that war. It is argued that Shona war fiction writers romanticised the war and in the process simplified and distorted history. The researcher postulates that writers’ perspectives on this liberation war were shaped by factors that include the mood of celebration and euphoria, the dominant ideology of the time, the situations of independence and freedom, and literary competitions. The thesis further raises and illustrates the point that writers produced romances of adventure because they were writing on the theme of war, and if one writes on the theme of war one ends up writing an adventure story. However, it is also acknowledged that because authors were writing on a historical event they could not ignore history completely. Some aspects of history are incorporated into the fiction, thereby retaining a semblance of historical realism. The post-independence period is also seen as a time of cultural revival and this is considered as the reason behind the authors’ tendency to celebrate Shona traditional institutions and culture. The celebration of Shona traditional religion and culture introduced into the fiction the element of the supernatural that strengthened the romance aspect of the novels. Shona war fiction writers also perpetuate female stereotyping. Female characters are depicted as everything except guerrilla fighters. It is argued that there are no female characters that play roles of guerrilla fighters because during the actual war women were not visible at the war front, fighting. The thesis argues that men, who were pioneers of the guerrilla war and writers of the war stories, excluded women from liberation war discourse and ultimately from literary discourse as well. A few writers who comment on the quality of Zimbabwe’s independence and freedom show the disillusionment and despair of the peasants and ex-combatants as they struggled to settle down and recover from the war. / African Languages / D.Litt. et Phil.

黃念欣. / 論文(哲學博士)--香港中文大學, 2004. / 參考文獻 (p. 354-462). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / Huang Nianxin. / Lun wen (Zhe xue bo shi)--Xianggang Zhong wen da xue, 2004. / Can kao wen xian (p. 354-462).

The dissertation focuses on the mapping of the southern African urban spaces and how it is linked to the urban dwellers' constitution of their identities, agency and subversion of the obtaining bleak and hegemonic conditions as represented in current fiction set in South Africa and Zimbabwe. Chapter 1 of the dissertation gives an overview of the social and historical developments characterising the construction of the southern African city from the colonial up to the current global city. The subordinate and marginal identities inscribed upon the Southern Africans as well as early forms of agency and subversion of the Western social, political and economic hegemony that has defined the city through out history will be looked at. Michael de Certeau's (1993) ideas showing the hegemonic Western socio-economic agenda's creation of ordinary urban dwellers' invisibility and fragmentation, which they later subvert by renaming and remapping the alienating urban spaces of New York to improve their own lives, will be taken into consideration in this chapter's definition of the construction of the city and urban identities. In Chapter 2, the representation of the southern African urban spaces' cartography in the fiction is discussed. The characteristic spaces ranging from the socially and morally decayed inner-city, the well-built postmodern and elite Central Business District, the affluent low-density suburbs and the far-away impoverished highdensity suburbs will be explored. The discussion attempts a complex unpacking of linkages between the mapping of Harare and Johannesburg with the hegemonic western social and economic agenda as well as the current urban dwellers' state of individual and psychological fragmentation. Chapter 3 examines the way in which the current southern African urban social dislocation is represented in the fiction. The complexity of the urban dislocation signified by the prevalence of violence, xenophobia and HIV/AIDS is discussed. There is also a dialectical analysis ofhow the depicted urban dislocation is located within the legacy of colonialism and apartheid, the western global cultural and economic influence as well as individual effort and decision-making in the chapter. Chapter 4 explores the ways in which gendered urban spaces are portrayed in the fiction. The subordination of primarily women, as well as the weak and dependent irrespective of gender is discussed. The resultant anxieties, alienation, marginalisation of women and the subservient are viewed from the traditional and colonial patriarchy's construction of the city as a predominantly masculine space excluding women. The western global cultural and economic hegemony's creation of a new gendered ideology characterised by the exclusion and feminisation of the poor, invisible and dependent is also discussed in this chapter. Nevertheless, the chapter ends with a discussion of the existing possibilities of female empowerment notably inscribed in the city's open education system, informal trade space as well as the provision of a social space encouraging pragmatic female decision-making especially in relation to HIV and AIDS. Finally the dissertation's concluding note is based on an evaluation of the postcolonial condition of southern Africa in relation to the mapping of the urban spaces and various identities represented in the fiction. An attempt is also made to place the research within the problematic of whether the mapping is based on postcolonialism or postmodernism. The objective here is to offer the importance of a cross-reading between the two as enabling a more meaningful conception of the region's current urban space. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2003.

The study has been prompted by the gap that exists regarding gender and land in Zimbabwean fiction. The study therefore seeks to interrogate the gender and land ownership discourse in Shona fiction in relation to the current conflict of access to land by race, class and gender. The study therefore examines the following fictional works; Feso (1956), Dzasukwa-Mwana-Asina-Hembe (1967), Pafunge (1972), Kuridza Ngoma Nedemo (1985), Vavariro (1990) and Sekai Minda Tave Nayo (2005). Of significance is the fact that the selected fictional works traverse the different historical periods that Zimbabwe as a nation has evolved through. Apart from analysing the selected fictional works, the study also collected data through open-ended interviews and questionnaires to triangulate findings from the fictional works. The selected fictional writers present the different experiences of black Zimbabweans through land loss and the strategies taken by the indigenous people in trying to regain their lost heritage, the land. The exegesis of the selected fictional works is guided by Afro-centred perspectives of Africana Womanism and Afrocentricity. Findings from most of the selected fictional works reveals the selective exclusion of blacks, both male and female, from accessing land and other vital resources from the colonial right up to post-independence periods in Zimbabwe. The study observes that Shona traditional culture accorded both genders the requisite space in terms of land ownership in the pre-colonial period. The study also establishes that colonialism through its numerous legislations stripped black men and women of the fertile land which they formerly collectively owned. The study also establishes that disillusioned black men and women worked extremely hard to regain their lost land as reflected in the unsanctioned land grabs as well as the government sanctioned Fast Track Land Reform Programme. Recommendations for future research include the expansion of such research to include works of fiction in other languages as well as different genres. Future land policies stand to benefit from the inclusion of women in decision making since women the world over have been confirmed as workers of the land. This is likely to deal with the gender divide regarding land ownership patterns both within and outside Zimbabwe. / African Languages / D. Litt. et Phil. (African Languages)

This thesis is an in-depth study of Shona fiction about the liberation war in Zimbabwe. It looks at the way Zimbabwe’s liberation war is portrayed in Shona fiction and focuses on the factors that shaped writers’ perspectives on that war. It is argued that Shona war fiction writers romanticised the war and in the process simplified and distorted history. The researcher postulates that writers’ perspectives on this liberation war were shaped by factors that include the mood of celebration and euphoria, the dominant ideology of the time, the situations of independence and freedom, and literary competitions. The thesis further raises and illustrates the point that writers produced romances of adventure because they were writing on the theme of war, and if one writes on the theme of war one ends up writing an adventure story. However, it is also acknowledged that because authors were writing on a historical event they could not ignore history completely. Some aspects of history are incorporated into the fiction, thereby retaining a semblance of historical realism. The post-independence period is also seen as a time of cultural revival and this is considered as the reason behind the authors’ tendency to celebrate Shona traditional institutions and culture. The celebration of Shona traditional religion and culture introduced into the fiction the element of the supernatural that strengthened the romance aspect of the novels. Shona war fiction writers also perpetuate female stereotyping. Female characters are depicted as everything except guerrilla fighters. It is argued that there are no female characters that play roles of guerrilla fighters because during the actual war women were not visible at the war front, fighting. The thesis argues that men, who were pioneers of the guerrilla war and writers of the war stories, excluded women from liberation war discourse and ultimately from literary discourse as well. A few writers who comment on the quality of Zimbabwe’s independence and freedom show the disillusionment and despair of the peasants and ex-combatants as they struggled to settle down and recover from the war. / African Languages / D.Litt. et Phil.