Becoming Zimbabwe is the first comprehensive history of Zimbabwe, spanning the years from 850 to 2008. In 1997, the then Secretary General of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions, Morgan Tsvangirai, expressed the need for a 'more open and critical process of writing history in Zimbabwe. ...The history of a nation-in-the-making should not be reduced to a selective heroic tradition, but should be a tolerant and continuing process of questioning and re-examination.' Becoming Zimbabwe tracks the idea of national belonging and citizenship and explores the nature of state rule, the changing contours of the political economy, and the regional and international dimensions of the country's history. In their Introduction, Brian Raftopoulos and Alois Mlambo enlarge on these themes, and Gerald Mazarire's opening chapter sets the pre-colonial background. Sabelo Ndlovu tracks the history up to WW11, and Alois Mlambo reviews developments in the settler economy and the emergence of nationalism leading to UDI in 1965. The politics and economics of the UDI period, and the subsequent war of liberation, are covered by Joesph Mtisi, Munyaradzi Nyakudya and Teresa Barnes. After independence in 1980, Zimbabwe enjoyed a period of buoyancy and hope. James Muzondidya's chapter details the transition 'from buoyancy to crisis', and Brian Raftopoulos concludes the book with an analysis of the decade-long crisis and the global political agreement which followed.

Crosses conventional theoretical, temporal, and geographical boundaries to show how the Ndau of southeast Africa actively shaped their own identity over a four-hundred-year period.

This anthology deals with the complexity, variety and experience of all the forms of mobility we witness today in Sub-Saharan Africa. Three sets of issues are being discussed. First, the concept of mobility itself is considered and how it is conceived of in distinction from sedentarity. Second, which forms of mobility can be distinguished, not only from the perspective of Western social sciences, but also from the perspective of people's own experiences, ideas, notions, etc? Social science in Africa has particularly focused on rural-urban migration, but it is clear that there are many other forms as well. Third, the concept of mobility concerns not only geographical space, but there are other 'spaces' to consider as well. In addition to 'forms of mobility' there is a 'mobility of forms' in which the perception of those other spaces plays a crucial role. In short, the book intends to turn the whole notion of mobility as a supposedly rupturing phenomenon on its head, emphasizing that rather through travelling connections are established and continuity is experienced. We are challenged to delve into the traveller's mind, to think and follow their multi-spatial livelihoods and to explore what it means to people if they move in a variety of spaces.

Tracing the Mbira Sound Archive in Zimbabwe analyses the revitalisation and repatriation of historical recordings from the largest sound archive in Africa, the International Library of African Music (ILAM). It provides a postcolonial study on the African sound archive divided into three historical periods: the colonial period offers a critical analysis on how ILAM classifies its music through ethnic and linguistic groups; the postcolonial period reconsiders postcolonial nationhood, new/old mobility and cultural border crossing in present Africa; and the recent period of repatriation focuses on the author’s revitalisation of the sound archive. The main goal of this study is to reconsider the colonial demarcations of southern African mbira music provided by the International Library of African Music (ILAM). These mbira recordings reveal that the harmonic system used in different lamellophones (or mbiras) in southern Africa is musically related. The analysis of sound archives in Africa is an essential tool to envision the new ways in which African culture can be directed not only from postcolonial notions of nationhood or Afrocentric discourses but also for the necessity of bringing awareness of the circulation of musical cultures from and beyond colonial African borders.

In Imagining a Nation, Ruramisai Charumbira analyzes competing narratives of the founding of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe constructed by political and cultural nationalists both black and white since occupation in 1890. The book uses a wide array of sources—including archives, oral histories, and a national monument—to explore the birth of the racialized national memories and parallel identities that were in vigorous contention as memory sought to present itself as history. In contrast with current global politics plagued by divisions of outsider and insider, patriot and traitor, Charumbira invites the reader into the liminal spaces of the region’s history and questions the centrality of the nation-state in understanding African or postcolonial history today. Using an interdisciplinary methodology, Charumbira offers a series of case studies, bringing in characters from far-flung places to show that history and memory in and of one small place can have a far-reaching impact in the wider world. The questions raised by these stories go beyond the history of colonized or colonizer in one former colony to illuminate contemporary vexations about what it means to be a citizen, patriot, or member of a nation in an ever-globalizing world. Rather than a history of how the rulers of Rhodesia or Zimbabwe marshaled state power to force citizens to accept a single definition of national memory and identity, Imagining a Nation shows how ordinary people invested in the soft power of individual, social, and collective memories to create and perpetuate exclusionary national myths. Reconsiderations in Southern African History

A RUSA 2007 Outstanding Reference Title The Encyclopedia of the Developing World is a comprehensive work on the historical and current status of developing countries. Containing more than 750 entries, the Encyclopedia encompasses primarily the years since 1945 and defines development broadly, addressing not only economics but also civil society and social progress. Entries cover the most important theories and measurements of development; relate historical events, movements, and concepts to development both internationally and regionally where applicable; examine the contributions of the most important persons and organizations; and detail the progress made within geographic regions and by individual countries.

Papers presented at the Cities in the World conference held at Southampton University and organised through the Society for Post-Medieval Archaeology challenged the commonly held perception that cities are about the present and the future, not about the past. All cities have an innate sense of the past, and this volume, encompassing as it does

The book provides empirically-rich case studies of the lives and livelihoods of marginalised ethnic minorities in colonial and post-colonial Zimbabwe, with a specific focus on diverse rural areas. It demonstrates the dynamic and complex relationships existing between ethnic minorities and livelihoods, and analyses the ways in which projects of belonging (and identity-formation) amongst these ethnic minorities are entangled in their respective livelihood construction projects, and vice versa. The ethnic minorities include those considered indigenous to Zimbabwe, and those often defined as ‘aliens’, including ethnicities with a transnational presence in southern Africa. The ethnicities studied in the book include the following: Chewa, Doma, Tonga, Tshwa San, Shangane, Basotho, Ndau, Hlengwe and Nambya. By studying their livelihoods in particular, this book offers the first full manuscript about ethnic minorities in Zimbabwe. In doing so, it highlights the significance of these ethnic minorities to Zimbabwean history, politics and society.