Reading the Zimbabwean National Anthem as Political Biography in the Context of Crisis

Abstract

The aim of this article is to render thinkable the idea of reading the Zimbabwean national anthem, Simudzai Mureza weZimbabwe, as a political biography. Biographies are people's lives narrated by others. However, the act of writing the lives of the nation in the form of an anthem, and then projecting these experiences as epitomising the lives of the individuals within the nation, is in fact marked by a disjuncture. This happens because by their very nature, acts of narrating individual or collective identities should always be viewed as approximations of that lived reality. Furthermore, national anthems as wish lists are based on some selected themes deemed of national importance by others and not everybody. This problem is at the heart of reading the Zimbabwean national anthem as a political biography. This article argues that if it is remembered that the lyrics of Simudzai Mureza weZimbabwe were composed by a literary figure, and selected and adopted by the Government of Zimbabwe, amongst other compositions, then there is reason to believe that there are, from that competition, some versions of the national anthem that were turned down, whose lyrical content Zimbabweans may never come to know of. Read from this "subversive" perspective, the Zimbabwean national anthem is a political biography "complete in its incompleteness" or incomplete in its completeness. 2 1.Since the year 2000 when the land grab began, Zimbabwe has continued to suffer from various crises manifest in violence against the political oppositional voices and the depreciation of the dollar against international currencies. While the Zimbabwe national anthem keeps on being such at events such as Independence Day on 18 April every year, the content of the lyrics of the song that emphasises peaceful coexistence is ridiculed by situations of continued violence of Zimbabweans against Zimbabweans. 2. The formulation that a text says more in what it does not say than in what it says suggests that there cannot be any text that can claim to be total, whole, or complete. For further elaboration of this concept see Macherey (1978). Downloaded by [The UC Irvine Libraries] at 13:41 19 October 2014 JLS/TLW 26 OpsommingDie doel van hierdie hoofstuk is om die gedagte van die Zimbabwiese volkslied, Simudzai Mureza weZimbabwe, as 'n politieke biografie denkbaar te maak. 'n Biografie is iemand se lewe deur iemand anders vertel. Die handeling van skryf oor die lewe van die nasie in die vorm van 'n volkslied, en hierdie ondervindings dan te projekteer as epitomisering van die lewens van die individue in die nasie, word trouens deur 'n disjunksie gekenskets. Dit gebeur omdat, uiteraard, narratiewe handelinge van individuele of kollektiewe identiteite altyd gesien moet word as approksimasies van die geleefde realiteit. Verder is volksliedere as wenslyste gegrond op 'n paar uitgesoekte temas wat deur sommige, nie almal nie, as van nasionale belang beskou word. Hierdie probleem is die kern van die lees van die Zimbabwiese volkslied as 'n politieke biografie. Hierdie art...

The deployment of a 'sacred song' in violence in Zimbabwe: The case of the song 'Zimbabwe Ndeye Ropa Ramadzibaba' (Zimbabwe was/is Born of the Blood of the Fathers/Ancestors) in Zimbabwean Politics

“…The national anthem says that Zimbabwe 'yakazvarwa nemoto weChimurenga neropa zhinji remagamba' (was born out of the fire of Chimurenga and the abundant blood of the heroes). Vambe and Khan (2009) contend that the national anthem can be read as a political biography which seeks to promote a particular version of Zimbabwe. The occurrence of blood in both 'Zimbabwe Ndeye Ropa' and the national anthem is not accidental.…”