You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
A meaningful and sustainable interpretation of decorative symbols found on Zimbabwe's items of material culture among the various ethnic groups is one that recognizes their fundamental cosmologies, world-views, beliefs, axiologies and epistemologies relating to nature, the universe, interpersonal and inter-group relations and, above all, the critical goals that a community seeks to attain. Where there is a community there must, of necessity, be communication channels that ensure social cohesion and commitment to one vision and mission. Geometric decorative symbols, which are the subject of this book, belong to the visual arts, a genre that communicates fundamental messages effortlessly and b...
A Cradle of the Revolution is a compelling book of stories by former Inyathi School students in the period before Zimbabwean independence. The stories render moving accounts of evictions in the colonial period, conditions at Inyathi school, and in particular the leadership qualities of Kenneth Maltus Smith, who was the school head. After leaving Inyathi school, many of the student participated in the struggle for independence. The book is an expose of the colonial conditions and efforts to dislodge colonialists and usher in independence and dignity for the black majority.
K.M.R Smythe grew up in Rhodesia Her family lived in the grounds of Ingutsheni Mental Hospital in Bulawayo from 1953-1971 where her father worked as a psychiatrist. As a child she grappled with many frightening situations and found strength and self-belief by becoming a successful tennis player. The Secret World of Shlomo Fine is an exploration of concealment and prejudice on many different levels. It is a story about an isolated and isolating experience inside one of the largest lunatic asylums built during British colonial rule in Africa. The book raises questions about the role that psychiatry holds in the Western imagination as accepted wisdom for healing human distress. What took place at Ingutsheni - first under British colonial rule, followed by UDI and the leadership of Ian Smith - needs to be more widely known. Similar institutions were built throughout the Empire, and many still exist throughout the world.
In 1999, a defiant 76-year old Mr Stanley Mhlanga confronted the Zimbabwean Forestry Commission. He claimed that Queen Lozikeyi had given his people the land from which they had been evicted. Who was this woman, an inspiration to an old man 80 years after her death? Queen Lozikeyi was the senior queen of Lobhengula, king of the Ndebele people in what is now Zimbabwe. Her early life has been wreathed in mystery, but now at last her story can be told. This book is one of the first studies of a woman who led her people while the British colonial power occupied her country. She was the intellect behind one of the most effective anti-colonial revolts. Queen Lozikeyi continues to be an inspiration to Zimbabweans today. Queen Lozikeyi, as an Ndebele royal woman, interited a strong constitutional position from Nguni royal foremothers in Zululand. This study shows how Lobhengula's senior queen and other Ndebele royal women uses their power.
The late Welshman Hadane Mabhena, was a leading Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU) activist, the political party led by Joshua Nkomo. He was among the pioneers of the liberation struggle in Nkayi and Matabeleland North. He faced incarceration in various prisons in Rhodesia. He was detained in Gonakudzingwa near the border with Mozambique. A loud and fearless voice for the voiceless, uMawelishi, as he was affectionately known among his colleagues and admirers, was declared a national hero when he passed on. While the focus of the book is on an individual, Welshman Mabhena, it also illuminates the times, both good and bad, that were an integral part of Welshman Mabhena’s life.
Dickson Netsha Sibanda’s life encompasses a great number of the key events of the past half century in Zimbabwe and the central African region as a whole. This biography is as much a social, economic and political history as much a history of one man. It is a story about movement and the cultural changes it brought, encompassing the pre-colonial arrival of Sibanda’s family in what would become Matabeleland, the upheavals of the arrival of the Ndebele and colonialisation by the British South Africa Company. Sibanda’s life is also a political story encompassing the rural spread of nationalism and armed struggle in exile. Above all the Sibanda’s story is one of an irrepressible entrepreneur with a powerful desire for education and unable to let opportunity pass him by.
None
Zimbabwe's Cultural Heritage won first prize in the Zimbabwe Book Publishers Association Awards in 2006 for Non-fiction: Humanities and Social Sciences. It is a collection of pieces of the culture of the Ndebele, Shona, Tonga, Kalanga, Nambiya, Xhosa and Venda. The book gives the reader an insight into the world view of different peoples, through descriptions of their history and life events such as pregnancy, marriage and death. "...the most enduring book ever on Zimbabwean history. This book will help people change their attitude towards each other in Zimbabwe." - Zimbabwe Book Publishers Association Awards citation