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Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozambique to the east. The capital and largest city is Harare. The second largest city is Bulawayo. A country of roughly 15 million people, Zimbabwe has 16 official languages, with English, Shona, and Ndebele the most common. Beginning in the 9th century, during its late Iron Age, the Bantu people built the city-state of Great Zimbabwe; the city-state became one of the major African trade centres by the 11th century, controlling the gold, ivory and copper trades with the Swahili coast, which were connected to Arab and Indian states. By the mid 15th century, the city-state had been abandoned. From there, the Kingdom of Zimbabwe was established, followed by the Rozvi and Mutapa empires.
Harare, originally known as Salisbury, is the capital and most populous city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of 940 km2 (371 mi2) and a population of 2.12 million in the 2012 census and an estimated 3.12 million in its metropolitan area in 2019. Situated in north-eastern Zimbabwe in the country's Mashonaland region, Harare is a metropolitan province, which also incorporates the municipalities of Chitungwiza and Epworth. The city sits on a plateau at an elevation of 1,483 metres above sea level and its climate falls into the subtropical highland category.
Zimbabwean music is heavily reliant on the use of instruments such as the mbira, Ngoma drums and hosho. Their music symbolizes much more than a simple rhythm, as the folk and pop style styled music was used as a symbol of hope for Zimbabweans looking to gain independence from Rhodesia. Music has played a significant role in the history of Zimbabwe, from a vital role in the traditional Bira ceremony used to call on ancestral spirits, to protest songs during the struggle for independence. The community in Zimbabwe used music to voice their resistance to their oppression, as one of the only weapons they had available to fight back with. In the eighties, the Music of Zimbabwe was at the center of the African Music scene thanks to genres such as Sungura and Jit. However, several performers were banned by state TV and radio leading to the closing of several music venues.
Thomas Tafirenyika Mapfumo is a musician nicknamed "The Lion of Zimbabwe" and "Mukanya" for his immense popularity and for the political influence he wields through his music, including his sharp criticism of the government of former Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe. He both created and made popular Chimurenga music, and his slow-moving style and distinctive voice is instantly recognisable to Zimbabweans.
The Bhundu Boys were a Zimbabwean band that played a mixture of chimurenga music with American rock and roll, disco, country, and pop influences. Their style became known as jit, and is quite popular across Africa, with some international success, and has influenced later groups like Nehoreka and Mokoomba. British world music DJ Andy Kershaw said that at the height of their magical powers they were "...the single most natural, effortless, catchy pop band I've ever heard"; the BBC's John Peel famously broke down in tears the first time, when he saw the band perform live.
Dambudzo Marechera was a Zimbabwean novelist, short story writer, playwright and poet. His short career produced a book of stories, two novels, a book of plays, prose, and poetry, and a collection of poetry. His first book, a fiction collection entitled The House of Hunger (1978), won the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1979. Marechera was best known for his abrasive, heavily detailed and self-aware writing, which was considered a new frontier in African literature, and his unorthodox behaviour at the universities from which he was expelled despite excelling in his studies.
Oliver "Tuku" Mtukudzi was a Zimbabwean musician, businessman, philanthropist, human rights activist and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador for Southern Africa Region.
The stone-carved Zimbabwe Bird is the national emblem of Zimbabwe, appearing on the national flags and coats of arms of both Zimbabwe and Rhodesia, as well as on banknotes and coins. It probably represents the bateleur eagle or the African fish eagle. The bird's design is derived from a number of soapstone sculptures found in the ruins of the medieval city of Great Zimbabwe.
Jonathan Nathaniel Mlevu Moyo is a Zimbabwean politician who served in the government of Zimbabwe as Minister of Higher Education from 2015 to 2017. He was previously Minister of Information and Publicity from 2000 to 2005 and again from 2013 to 2015. He was elected to the House of Assembly of Zimbabwe as an independent candidate in 2005 and 2008. He is considered the core architect of the AIPPA and POSA restrictive legislation.
White Zimbabweans also called Rhodesians are people in Zimbabwe who are of European descent. In linguistic, cultural, and historical terms, these Zimbabweans of European ethnic origin are mostly English-speaking descendants of British settlers and a small minority of them are either Afrikaans-speaking descendants of Afrikaners from South Africa and/or those descended from Greek and Portuguese immigrants.
Nicholas Mukomberanwa was a Zimbabwean sculptor and art teacher. He was among the most famous protégés of the Workshop School at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe. He was a mentor to the Mukomberanwa Family of sculptors. Mukomberanwa married his first wife, sculptor Grace, in 1965 and they had eight children. In 1965, he decided to end his career with the police to become a sculptor full-time. He continued to hone his skills over the following decade, developing one of the most distinctive personal styles found in his generation of Zimbabwean stone sculptors. The gambit paid off, and by the late 1970s and in the 1980s his work was being shown in many venues. His work has been exhibited in galleries around the world. He also became mentor to many artists in Zimbabwe, including his children Anderson Mukomberanwa, Ennica Mukomberanwa, Lawrence Mukomberanwa, Netsai Mukomberanwa, Taguma Mukomberanwa,Tendai Mukomberanwa and nephew, Nesbert Mukomberanwa who are also sculptors. He remains one of Zimbabwe's most famous artists.
John Takawira was a Zimbabwean sculptor. The background to the sculptural movement of which he was a leading member is given in the article on Shona art.
Brian Chikwava is a Zimbabwean writer and musician. His short story "Seventh Street Alchemy" was awarded the 2004 Caine Prize for African writing in English; Chikwava became the first Zimbabwean to do so. He has been a Charles Pick fellow at the University of East Anglia, and lives in London. He continues to write in England and put out an album titled Jacaranda Skits.
Agnieszka Piotrowska is an author, academic and award-winning filmmaker, probably best known for her 2008 documentary Married to the Eiffel Tower, about women who fall in love with objects."
"Baba Jukwa" is a self-given nickname for a Zimbabwean political online blogger. He is believed to be part of the Vapanduki crew, a group which includes disgruntled ZANU-PF insiders, service chiefs and other civil servants in Zimbabwe. Most of his writings are brought out via his Facebook page, which boasts over 400,000 followers.
Charles Charamba is a Zimbabwean gospel musician and a former pastor in the Apostolic Faith Mission Church of Zimbabwe (AFM). He has since started his church. Charamba's albums have been the top selling gospel music in Zimbabwe since the early 2000s. He has toured both Great Britain and the United States, and throughout southern Africa. One of Charamba's most famous songs is "Machira Chete". His wife, Olivia, is also a gospel singer, and appears with him on stage and on his albums; they are often called the "First Family of Gospel". According to Chinoitezvi Honour Charles charamba lives in The Surbub of Gunhill in Harare. His children are also talented in music.
Michael Raeburn is a Zimbabwean filmmaker.
Relations between the UK and Zimbabwe have been complex since the latter's independence in 1980. The territory of modern Zimbabwe had been colonised by the British South Africa Company in 1890, with the Pioneer Column raising the Union Jack over Fort Salisbury and formally establishing company, and by extension, British, rule over the territory. In 1920 Rhodesia, as the land had been called by the company in honour of their founder, Cecil Rhodes, was brought under jurisdiction of the Crown as the colony of Southern Rhodesia. Southern Rhodesia over the decades following its establishment would slowly be populated by large numbers of Europeans emigrants who came to form a considerable diaspora, largely consisting of Britons but also smaller groups of Italians, Greeks and Afrikaners. A settler culture that had already existed since the time of company would come to cement fully and the white population began to identify as Rhodesians, often in conjunction with British/Afrikaner/Southern European identities of their ancestors. Southern Rhodesia would go on to participate heavily in both the First and Second wars, providing soldiers and military equipment to the British war effort. During the years after the war, the relationship between Britain and Southern Rhodesia became increasingly strained. The UK had opted to decolonise Africa and had adopted a firm policy of no independence before majority rule, which deeply upset the white establishment of the colony, in particular the radical Rhodesian Front party led by Winston Field and later, Ian Smith. Relations between the British Government and the colonial Southern Rhodesian government deteriorated for much of the early 1960s and negotiations between the two dragged on with little to no success. Eventually, relations broke down entirely and Southern Rhodesia unilaterally declared independence from Britain. The move was met with zero recognition from the international community and the UK government and the illegitimate state was still formally considered under British sovereignty for its roughly 15-year span of existence. For the first 5 years of its proclaimed independence, Rhodesia still declared loyalty to the Queen Elizabeth II as a would-be Commonwealth realm, but this was never recognised by the British monarch who continued to encourage Smith's illegal government to resign. Given her refusal to appoint a Governor-general, from 1965 to 1970 an "Officer Administering the Government" served as the de facto head of state. Rhodesia eventually moved to sever all links with Britain and became a republic with a president in 1970. Throughout the subsequent Rhodesian Bush War between white Rhodesians and black paramilitaries such as ZANU and ZAPU, the UK continued to remain staunchly opposed to the rogue state and extensively sanctioned it, even enforcing blockades using the Royal Navy to cut off Rhodesian oil imports via Portuguese Mozambique. When Rhodesia failed to hold out after 15 years of fighting and came to the negotiating table with the black resistance groups and moderate African nationalist parties, the UK again became directly involved in Rhodesia's affairs. After a brief stint as the nation of Zimbabwe Rhodesia following an Internal Settlement that was denounced by the international community for not being satisfactory enough, the nation transiently reverted to its status as a self-governing British colony before being granted full independence and majority rule as Zimbabwe in 1980 under the landmark Lancaster House Agreement.
Zimbabwe has an active film culture that includes films made in Zimbabwe during its pre- and post-colonial periods. Economic crisis and political crisis have been features of the industry. A publication from the 1980s counted 14 cinemas in Zimbabwe's capital city, Harare. According to a 1998 report only 15 percent of the population had been to a cinema. European and American films have been made on location in Zimbabwe as well as Indian films. American films are popular in Zimbabwe but face restrictions limiting their distribution.
Greenwood Park is both a city park and a small urban neighbourhood located in the northeast section of Harare's central business district and is one of the early subdivisions which were created inside Harare, but which lay outside of the original, officially-planned City of Salisbury. Situated two kilometres north of Parliament, Greenwood Park overlaps with the larger and newer neighbourhood of Avenues and is usually considered to be a part of that more prominent locale. The area of Greenwood Park, and is best known for its eponymous park which covers much of the area.
References
- ↑ "Jit | Jonathan Rosenbaum".
- ↑ Holden, Stephen (20 March 1993). "Reviews/Film Festival; A Quirky Ancestor And the Road to Love". The New York Times. Retrieved 9 January 2020.
- ↑ McCrea, Barbara. The Rough Guide to Zimbabwe. Rough Guides, 2000, p. 377.
- ↑ Schmidt, Nancy J (April 1994). "African Filmmakers and Their Films". African Studies Review. 37 (1): 175–181. doi:10.2307/525118. JSTOR 525118.
- ↑ Rayner, Jonathan. Cinema and Landscape: Film, Nation and Cultural Geography: Film, Nation and Cultural Geography. Intellect Books Limited, 2010, p. 78.
- ↑ Thompson, Katrina Daly. Zimbabwe's Cinematic Arts: Language, Power, Identity. Indiana University Press, 2013, p. 211.
