‘Catch the Cockerel Before Dawn’: Pentecostalism and Politics in Post-Colonial Zimbabwe

Africa ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 70 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-277 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Maxwell
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Assemblies Of God ◽  
Cultural Nationalism ◽  
Religious Right ◽  
The Other ◽  
State Change ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Ruling Party

AbstractThe article examines relations between pentecostalism and politics in post-colonial Zimbabwe through a case study of one of Africa’s largest pentecostal movements, Zimbabwe Assemblies of God, Africa (ZAOGA). The Church’s relations with the state change considerably from the colonial to the post-colonial era. The movement began as a sectarian township-based organisation which eschewed politics but used white Rhodesian and American contacts to gain resources and modernise. In the first decade of independence the leadership embraced the dominant discourses of cultural nationalism and development but fell foul of the ruling party, ZANU/PF, because of its ‘seeming’ connections with the rebel politician Ndabiningi Sithole and the American religious right. By the 1990s ZAOGA and ZANU/PF had embraced, each drawing legitimacy from the other. However, this reciprocal assimilation of elites and the authoritarianism of ZAOGA’s leadership are in tension with the democratic egalitarian culture found in local assemblies, where the excesses of leaders are challenged. These alternative pentecostal practices are in symbiosis with radical township politics and progressive sources in civil society. Thus, while pentecostalism may renew the process of politics in Zimbabwe, it may itself be renewed by the outside forces of wider Zimbabwean society.

The ant as metaphor: Orientalism, imperialism and myrmecology [W. T. Stearn Student Essay]

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 347-361
Author(s):  
Carissa Chew
Keyword(s):  
New World ◽  
Ant Colony ◽  
The Other ◽  
White People ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Inferior Status ◽  
Colonial Theory ◽  
The One ◽  
Civilized Society

Myrmecological texts that circulated in Britain in the nineteenth and early twentieth century can be interpreted, from the perspective of the post-colonial theory of Orientalism, as belonging to a wider body of colonial-era European literature that has historically portrayed New World peoples and animals as the “Other”. In implicit ways, colonial-era literature on ant behaviour reproduces the Orientalist dichotomy of civilization and savagery. At different times, the ant colony has been portrayed, somewhat paradoxically, as both a civilized society in miniature and a foreign savage order. On the one hand, some British myrmecological texts rendered the ant as a symbol of Britishness and civilization: the elevated image of the ant reflected the imperialist trope that non-white people were inferior, savage Others. On the other hand, the ant colony was portrayed elsewhere in British myrmecological literature – and in other European texts that were translated into English and circulated in Britain – as a dangerous, merciless and aggressive Otherness itself. Accordingly, in these texts, the ant and the “native” are depicted as accomplices who share an antagonism toward the colonial project. Both these positive and negative representations of the ant reflect and reproduce Orientalist tropes, which have historically been used to emphasize the perceived inferior status of non-white colonial subjects.

Afterword A Long Road To Travel

2018 ◽  
pp. 257-274
Author(s):  
Alec G. Hargreaves ◽  
Mark McKinney
Keyword(s):  
Public Funding ◽  
The Other ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
The Road ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Box Office ◽  
On The Road ◽  
The One ◽  
Minority Ethnic

In assessing the extent to which creative works by post-migratory artists are shaped by the legacy of the colonial era in present-day France, we delineate a spectrum stretching between two poles – on the one hand, postcolonial entrenchment, and on the other, post/colonial detachment – between which lie a range of more nuanced and multi-polar positions. Politically hard-edged rappers typify the more entrenched end of the spectrum, positioning themselves in conflict with the state and appealing to audiences in which post-colonial minorities are to the fore. More consensual positions, suggesting that France is moving or has moved beyond the polarized divisions of the colonial era, tend to characterize the work of artists such as professional dancers benefiting from public funding and others, such as the filmmaker and actor Dany Boon, whose minority ethnic origins have been largely effaced in productions that have achieved high-profile box office successes among broadly based audiences. The works of many other post-migratory artists are positioned between and in some respects disjunct from these poles, tracing multi-polar trajectories in which Anglophone spaces often displace the binary logic of (post-)colonialism. At the same, many of these artists complain that, no matter how hard they may try to leave behind divisions inherited from the colonial past, they remain in many ways framed by them in majority ethnic eyes, suggesting that a long journey still lies ahead on the road from a neo-colonial to a post/colonial France.

scholarly journals Modern landscaping and medicinal plant loss as a legacy of colonialism in Nigeria (Lokoja as case study).

2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 197-203
Author(s):  
Michael Oloyede Alabi
Keyword(s):  
Urban Design ◽  
City Planning ◽  
Town Planning ◽  
Colonial Rule ◽  
Indigenous Plants ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Town

This paper aims to trace the history of colonial urban planning in Nigerian cities, its legacies of urban design and beautification of the environment. In Nigeria the town planning institutional frame works was established under the colonial rule which persisted to the post colonial period. In this sense the colonial era was a phase in which European institutions and values systems were transferred to Nigeria, one of which is the concept of environmental beautification with the use of plants. An investigation is carried out on the influence of colonial rule on landscaping and urban design. Findings show that the introduction of deliberate landscaping to city planning have over the years systematically led to loss of valuable indigenous plants partly due to the introduction of exotic plants. These are plants that initially were seen as sources of cure for several ailments. There is therefore the need for a rethink as to the type of plants to be used for landscaping.

Chieftaincy, Development and the Ghanaian State: A Historical Overview of the 19th and 20th Centuries

2018 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 89-119
Author(s):  
James Kojo KUTIN ◽  
Kwame Osei KWARTENG
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
The Other ◽  
Important Case ◽  
Northern Ghana ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Southern Ghana

This multi-sourced paper explores the relationship between the chieftaincy institution and the Ghanaian state in the 19th and 20th centuries. It specifically looks at how the relationship between the two has evolved in the overlapping political and economic spheres and how the metamorphosing conceptualization of development on both sides fits into it. Using mainly Asante references,1 this paper argues that the relationship between the state (colonial and post-colonial) and chieftaincy in both spheres has been determined by the policies of the former to either court or curtail the power of the latter when it suits its politics. Chiefs on the other hand, recognizing the nature of this relationship, have skilfully played a “survival politics” strategy in order to remain relevant in the economic and political spheres. This strategy in recent years includes (re)identifying itself with prevailing concepts such as development and either utilising, or readjusting local ideologies where necessary, in order to ensure their own institutional survival.   _________________________________________ 1 The examples utilised in this paper focus on the experience of chieftaincy in southern Ghana, particularly Asante and Akan in general. This is not because happenings in chieftaincy in northern Ghana are not significant. Rather it is because the study is based on the southern experience, particularly, that of the Asante. While the Asante chieftaincy institution does not always mirror the nature of chieftaincy in the entire southern Ghana, its scope and reach presents an important case study to measure the extent of changes that occurred during the 19th and 20th centuries.

scholarly journals Indonesian Political Islam: Capitalist Development and the Legacies of the Cold War

2011 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-38 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vedi R. Hadiz
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Political Islam ◽  
New Order ◽  
Capitalist Development ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Sociological Factors ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The City

This article explores the genesis of Indonesian political Islam and its interactions with the nationalist secular state in the immediate post-colonial era while examining some of the origins of the ‘radical’ stream that has garnered much attention in the current post-authoritarian period. It puts forward the idea that, rather than an outcome of Indonesian democratisation, this stream was in fact the product of authoritarian New Order rule. The article also considers some parallels in the trajectories of political Islam more generally in Indonesia, the Middle East and North Africa, especially as a kind of populist response to the tensions and contradictions of global capitalism. It addresses the city of Surakarta (Solo) as a case study and highlights the importance of Cold War politics in moulding political Islam in Indonesia and elsewhere. The approach emphasises historical and sociological factors shaping political Islam that have tended to be relegated to the background in prevalent security-oriented analyses concerned with issues of terrorism and violence.

Whose Swadeshi? Contending Nationalisms among Indian Christians

2004 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 232-246 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Tharamangalam
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Lower Caste ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Nationalist Discourse ◽  
Oppositional Discourse ◽  
The One ◽  
Western Hegemony

AbstractThe current resurgence of Hindu fundamentalism in India is broadly situated in the search for a pan-Indian Hindu identity, and in the assertion of a pan-Indian "Hindutva" (Hindu-ness) that is claimed to be the true heritage of Indians. This discourse inevitably involves the demarcation of the "Hindu" from the "other" — minorities defined as less Indian, if not foreign. Historical grievances are constructed against them and used to justify attacks on them. These "others", however, have their own discourses, their own constructions of identities, and their own articulations of historical grievances; and these are not necessarily defensive, or reactions to the Hindu fundamentalist discourse. This paper discusses the nationalist discourse of Indian Christians during the anti-colonial struggles and in the post-colonial era; an era that contained not only a rejection of Western colonial domination, but also a critique of Western hegemony over Christianity itself. Included in this discourse are the celebration of indigenous Christian traditions on the one hand, and the "Inculturation" (or simply, Indianization) of Christianity in such areas as the liturgy and even theology. Ironically, however, this process, spearheaded by the "upper caste" Christian elite, led to an oppositional discourse of the subaltern "lower caste" Christians, who resent what they see as "Sanskritization" or even "Brahminization". They have attempted to formulate their own forms of inculturation, including a sophisticated Dalit Theology. This paper examines the dialectic of these discourses, situating these in their specific historical, local-global contexts.

scholarly journals UKRAINIAN NATIONAL ELITE OF THE POST-COLONIAL ERA: CIVIL DIMENSION

2017 ◽  
pp. 86-93
Author(s):  
Tetiana Voropayeva
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Colonial Period ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
Self Organization ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Social Transformations ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Empirical Perspective ◽  
Qualitative State

The article analyzes the Ukrainian national elite of the postcolonial era through the prism of citizenship. In recent years, the interest in elitist issues has been grown significantly. In modern socio-humanitarian field, the issues of the elites’ role in the modern world, the criteria for evaluating different elite’s activity, the measure of their citizenship, patriotism and professionalism are often discussed. Positive social transformations in many respects depend on the qualitative state of modern Ukrainian elites, on their socio-political maturity, on their willingness and ability to consolidate Ukrainian society, on the level of their responsibility for the fate of Ukraine. The author of the article follows to the concept of plurality of elites (based on the idea of distinguishing elite groups in the fields of their leading activities), which enables the allocation of political, ideological, publicadministrative, military, economic and engineering, scientific, spiritual, medical, educational (pedagogical), cultural-artistic, religious, informational, sporting, etc. In the post-colonial period, all these elite groups must become an integral elements of the Ukrainian national elite. In article the citizen is analyzed as a subject of qualitative social transformations in the post-colonial period, as well as civil practices of self-organization of society in the context of modern transformational processes in Ukraine by the article. The phenomenon of civic activity of an elitist person is analyzed in a theoretical, methodological and empirical perspective. The article deals with theoretical and methodological bases, structure and development peculiarities of the civil position of the personality. Civil society is seen as a cultural and historical type of society. The peculiarities of its formation and functioning in post-colonial Ukraine are analyzed. The author suggests his own periodization of the civil society development in Ukraine. So, the Ukrainian national elite would become the true subject of decolonization of Ukraine and positive social transformations only when all its representatives will begin to perform their core functions in a responsible way: culture-creating, state-building, nation-building, as well as consolidating, creative-transforming, forecasting, motivational, mobilizing, administrating, spiritual-ideological, identification, patriotic, humanistic, axiological, democratic, stabilizing, strategic, security, etc. The Ukrainian national elite must respond on time to the challenges posed by time (globalization, ecological, economic, technological, informational, etc.). The most important for modern Ukraine isn’t only the formation of an effective and responsible political elite that could consolidate other elite groups, directing their activities in a constructive way, but also ensuring its timely rotation, qualitative upgrading, de-oligarchy and overcoming its alienation from society. The national elite must carry out highquality legal, political, socio-economic, socio-cultural, technological, ecological and other transformations; to support the integrity and spiritual unity of society, the development of democracy and self-organization processes in Ukraine, the formation and approval of a civil-political and European civilization identity of Ukrainian citizens.

scholarly journals Old Questions, New Techniques: A Research Note on the Computational Identification of Political Elites

2015 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 386-401 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacqueline Hicks ◽  
Vincent Traag ◽  
Ridho Reinanda
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Research Note ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
The Other ◽  
New Method ◽  
Computational Techniques ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
New Techniques ◽  
Computational Identification

This paper presents a new method of identifying a nation’s political elite using computational techniques on digitised newspaper articles. It begins by describing the three most widely used methods of identifying political elites: positional, decisional and reputational. It then introduces the “reported elite method”, exploring the kinds of elites it detects and how well it reflects the composition of political elites in our case study of Indonesia. Compared to the other existing methods, we find that our method casts a much wider net when searching for political elites, resulting in many more people from civil society, far fewer formal politicians, and challenging conventional notions of who is a political elite. The method has two major underlying assumptions: (1) the newspapers from which the texts are drawn are free and fairly representative and (2) political power can be inferred from frequent appearance in newspapers alongside other frequently appearing individuals in computational “communities” of political elite.

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