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Remaking Mutirikwi
Landscape, Water and Belonging in Southern Zimbabwe
-
Joost Fontein
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2015
About this book
Finalist for the African Studies Association 2016 Melville J. Herskovits Award
A detailed ethnographic and historical study of the implications of fast-track land reform in Zimbabwe from the perspective of those involvedin land occupations around Lake Mutirikwi, from the colonial period to the present day.
The Mutirikwi river was dammed in the early 1960s to make Zimbabwe's second largest lake. This was a key moment in the Europeanisation of Mutirikwi's landscapes, which had begun with colonial land appropriations in the 1890s. ButAfrican landscapes were not obliterated by the dam. They remained active and affective. At independence in 1980, local clans reasserted ancestral land claims in a wave of squatting around Lake Mutirikwi. They were soon evicted asthe new government asserted control over the remaking of Mutirikwi's landscapes. Amid fast-track land reform in the 2000s, the same people returned again to reclaim the land. Many returned to the graves and ruins of past lives forged in the very substance of the soil, and even incoming war veterans and new farmers appealed to autochthonous knowledge to make safe their resettlements.
This book explores those reoccupations and the complex contests overlandscape, water and belonging they provoked. The 2000s may have heralded a long-delayed re-Africanisation of Lake Mutirikwi, but just as African presence had survived the dam, so white presence remains active and affective through Rhodesian-era discourses, place-names and the materialities of ruined farms, contour ridging and old irrigation schemes.
Through lenses focused on the political materialities of water and land, this book reveals how the remaking of Mutirikwi's landscapes has always been deeply entangled with changing strategies of colonial and postcolonial statecraft. It highlights how the traces of different pasts intertwine in contemporary politics through the active, enduring yet emergent, forms and substances of landscape.
Joost Fontein is Director of the British Institute in Eastern Africa and Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh.
Published in association with the British Institute in Eastern Africa.
A detailed ethnographic and historical study of the implications of fast-track land reform in Zimbabwe from the perspective of those involvedin land occupations around Lake Mutirikwi, from the colonial period to the present day.
The Mutirikwi river was dammed in the early 1960s to make Zimbabwe's second largest lake. This was a key moment in the Europeanisation of Mutirikwi's landscapes, which had begun with colonial land appropriations in the 1890s. ButAfrican landscapes were not obliterated by the dam. They remained active and affective. At independence in 1980, local clans reasserted ancestral land claims in a wave of squatting around Lake Mutirikwi. They were soon evicted asthe new government asserted control over the remaking of Mutirikwi's landscapes. Amid fast-track land reform in the 2000s, the same people returned again to reclaim the land. Many returned to the graves and ruins of past lives forged in the very substance of the soil, and even incoming war veterans and new farmers appealed to autochthonous knowledge to make safe their resettlements.
This book explores those reoccupations and the complex contests overlandscape, water and belonging they provoked. The 2000s may have heralded a long-delayed re-Africanisation of Lake Mutirikwi, but just as African presence had survived the dam, so white presence remains active and affective through Rhodesian-era discourses, place-names and the materialities of ruined farms, contour ridging and old irrigation schemes.
Through lenses focused on the political materialities of water and land, this book reveals how the remaking of Mutirikwi's landscapes has always been deeply entangled with changing strategies of colonial and postcolonial statecraft. It highlights how the traces of different pasts intertwine in contemporary politics through the active, enduring yet emergent, forms and substances of landscape.
Joost Fontein is Director of the British Institute in Eastern Africa and Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh.
Published in association with the British Institute in Eastern Africa.
Author / Editor information
Contributor: Joost Fontein
Joost Fontein is Professor of Anthropology, University of Johannesburg. He was previously Director of the British Institute in Eastern Africa and Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh. His books include Remaking Mutirikwi: Landscape, Water and Belonging (James Currey, 2015), shortlisted for the African Studies Association 2016 Herskovits Prize.
Topics
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Frontmatter
i -
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Contents
vi -
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Illustrations
ix -
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Acknowledgements
x -
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Note on Fieldwork, Notes & Sources
xii -
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Glossary
xiii -
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Acronyms & Abbreviations
xvii -
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Chronology
xix -
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Remaking Mutirikwi: An Introduction
1 - PART ONE Remaking Mutirikwi in the 2000s
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1 New Farmers, Old Claims
26 -
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2 Graves, Ruins and Belonging
52 -
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3 Rain, Power and Sovereignty
78 -
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4 Hippos, Fishing and Irrigation
112 -
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5 Genealogical Geographies
139 - PART TWO Damming Mutirikwi 1940s–1990s
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6 New White Futures, New Rhodesian Settlers and Large-scale Irrigation, 1940s–1950s
170 -
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7 Remaking Fort Victoria’s Landscapes, 1950s–1960s
197 -
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8 War & Danger in the Wake of the Dam, 1970s
230 -
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9 Promising Returns and Frustrated Futures in the Wake of War, 1980s–1990s
256 -
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Epilogue: Remaking Mutirikwi in the late 2000s & early 2010s
288 -
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Bibliography
310 -
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Index
329
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
June 19, 2024
eBook ISBN:
9781782045243
Original publisher:
James Currey
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook ISBN:
9781782045243
Keywords for this book
Remaking Mutirikwi; landscape; water; belonging; Zimbabwe; colonial period; fast-track land reform; African landscapes; political materialities; cultural change; British Institute in Eastern Africa
Audience(s) for this book
For an expert adult audience, including professional development and academic research
