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Paper Abstract: How the earily 19th Century South African leader has been historically perceived. Discusses 3 monographs of his life. Paper Introduction: This research explores ways in which Shaka Zulu (1787-1828), an early-19th-century South African leader of the Zulu people, has been perceived throughout history. In an examination of three monographs dealing with the life of Shaka, the research will set forth the context for evaluating both historical and historiographical treatments of his biography, and then discuss the bases on which a given treatment of the biography appear to be been structured. Introduction and Background The gradual, complex, event-filled, and sometimes violent dismantling of the European colonial apparatus over the course of the 20th century can sometimes conceal the fact that the history of Africa is not confined to the history of Europe in Africa. The European project of colonialism, in the context of trans Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. The traders encountered these different views of Shaka in many contexts ranging from his court--in circumstances of his making-- to contracts with the rebellious Qwabe, Khumalo, Lala, and others (Hamilton, 1999, p. To be sure, Ritter cites assorted barbarisms of European wars, fromthe ancient period through Napoleon and World War II. Given two accounts of a life, one surely is wrong, but bothmay be wrong, and for either the same or different reasons. In an examination of three monographs dealing with thelife of Shaka, the research will set forth the context for evaluating bothhistorical and historiographical treatments of his biography, and thendiscuss the bases on which a given treatment of the biography appear to bebeen structured.Introduction and Background The gradual, complex, event-filled, and sometimes violent dismantlingof the European colonial apparatus over the course of the 2 th century cansometimes conceal the fact that the history of Africa is not confined tothe history of Europe in Africa. This was all pretty muchfactitious. The most serious violation of law waspregnancy, which Shaka decreed would be illegal for the year of mourning(Golan, 1994). On one hand is the oral tradition of the Zulus, on whichwhite-authored histories besides that of Ritter rely. This evaluation of the use to which Shaka is put by the IFP suggeststhat Zulu history is a malleable expedient employed by IFP at its leaders'sole discretion. 125). Stuart wanted toestablish a colonial department specifically dedicated to studying thenative peoples of South Africa, as it were a professional ethnographicbureaucracy. Three monographs, one written in1955 and two others written in the 199 s, demonstrate a variety ofperceptions of Shaka, as well as the variety of political and cultural usesto which specific perceptions and interpretations have been put. Theyare in any case conscious myths, which Golan supports by citing thestriking similarities between the general outline of the Shaka biographiesand such myths as those involving biblical heroes. Thus on one hand the IFP declares itself to have done nothing specialwith respect to its claim on Zulu identity and history, but on the otherhand it engages in a specific historical method to reinforce a specialclaim on history and politics. On this view, one must conclude thatEurope colonized Africa for Africa's own good.Shaka: History, Biography, and Myth, Part 2: Golan In the work of both Golan and Hamilton, a narrative dynamic markedlydifferent from that of Ritter is at work. Another feature of oral histories that Hamilton discusses is evidenceof their highly varied voices. Butpolitical institutions by their nature seem less likely to capture popularimagination and enthusiasm than towering charismatic leadership. . Two dynamics are at work.One involves "power, control of resources, methods of government, and theimportance of ethnic divisions to the black community" (Golan, 1994, p.11). IFP's use of this feature of Zulu historyhas been twofold. Buthelezi has beenquoted to the effect that white authorship of oral histories is unreliable,even though he has also advocated more credence for oral histories per se.After noting that there is no formal Inkatha history and that confirmationof IFP assertions must rely on published reports and speeches, Golan pointsout that Buthelezi has tended toward use of "copious footnotes in theacademic style and . Included in the IFP's efforts against ANC national governanceauthority in the postapartheid period was its highly publicized specialadvocacy for Zulu nationalist privileges, such as carrying "traditionalweapons" associated with Zulu warrior identity. Thuswhite South Africans have one image of Shaka, that of murderous tyrant,while many black South Africans have other images, a heroic, unifyingwarrior with a vision of a single black South Africa independent ofEuropean colonial rule. Indeed, the handwriting wason the wall for the colonial powers in Africa as early as 1918, in theaftermath of the Great War. Another, accordingto Golan (pp. Shaka's excess ofslaughter began to attract the attention of various sets of English tradersand military officials in the area, and Ritter argues that Shaka triedwithout much success to receive approval for rather than indifference tohis history and plans for enlarging his empire. The earliest of the three books germane to this research is written byone E.A. 21). More generally, Ritter expresses his thanks to onecolonial soldier, civil servant, and landed settler after another, asfacilitators of the book project. But the aftermath of the assassination is in-fighting andadvantage-seeking, though the conspirators make a project of seeking outhis lover Pampata, who is driven to suicide. . With the notion of empire builder attached tohim, Shaka could be a proxy at once for black nationalism and for Zululeadership in pan-African black rule. In other words, Ritter may have beendeliberately concerned to tell Shaka's absorbing story, a testament to hisown history in South Africa. Through the work of partisan journalists andlater IFP personnel as well: Inkatha claims not only that it does not reconstruct history (but just tells it "the way it happened") but also that it has a uniquely Zulu way of understanding the past (Golan, 1994, p. However, asRitter spins the tale, the empire builder appears to have degenerated intoa king with a royal blood lust, capriciously executing people for realand/or imagined offenses. How unsophisticated they were will be gathered from the fact that when they were first presented with a mirror by the Europeans they viewed it with alarm as an uncanny charm, and after a while made passes behind it to catch, as they thought, the person whom they saw (Ritter, 1995, p. First there is her careful documentation of attemptsby white trader/colonialists such as Fynn (at least in initial contactswith Shaka) and by colonial authorities such as Shepstone to find a way todeal with the Zulus in an environment of cordiality. He cites his marked indebtedness to A.T.Bryant's history of Zulu culture and to the diaries of Mr. Francis Fynn,who "was constantly and frequently in Shaka's company, and it is a rulethat no document has so much value to the historian as a contemporary one"(p. Shaka then consolidates his own power by using "witch hunters" topurge internal enemies yet raising the prestige of the warriors above thatof the "divining fraternity" (p. . . It is the symbol of a unified politicalentity that seems most important. 59), while also putting into "final form," in a violation of thevery conception of the mutability of oral tradition, the praise poems. Golan's book on the Shaka phenomenon starts with the premise thatShaka "is the subject of a major strand of literature written on the Zuluand has become an important symbol . .Even had Shaka . What that seemsto mean most significantly, as the subtitle of the monograph indicates, isthat white colonialist writers, particularly those working close to thetime of Shaka's life and career, could not necessarily construct a versionof the Shaka myth with the specific and programmatic purpose of reinforcingthe colonial project in Africa. Stuart observed that anthropology had the potential to study fruitfully the process of contact between Africans and Europeans (Hamilton, 1998, p. The bulk of Golan's book is devoted to the ways in which the Inkathaparty, later Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), led by Buthelezi, appears to havehad greatest success in the modern period by appropriating the image of aShaka as emperor of a unified Zulu empire as a symbol of its vision of aunified black nation in Africa. Equally important as a limitedinnate cosmic sensibility is Shaka's limited capacity for socialimprovement. ThusIFP would have a landed ethnic power base from which to promulgate itsversion of black nationalism and distinguish itself from the manyethnicities in the region. But that agenda, or bias, does notappear to have been linked (despite his acquaintance with world's championimperialist jingoist Rudyard Kipling) to a grand imperial vision of pinkcountries on the map and a global vision of an empire on which the sunnever set, except perhaps in the most general assumptionist terms; in thatregard, Hamilton considers him an "ambiguous" figure and resource for Zuluhistoriography. 2 )characterizes Ritter's book as a "blood-and-thunder" account focusing onShaka's personality and life that owes much to H. References Golan, D. . Indeed, he connects his assertion thatthe biography puts "the Zulus and their kings in their true historicallight" (1995, p. The means by which IFP urged its nationalist agenda goes to the issueof what Golan characterizes as deliberate manipulation of historicaldiscourse. It appears not to have occurred to Ritter that it is not onlypermissible but virtually mandatory for the historian to interrogateresources and prejudices, including his own. It was in that period that programmatic Zulunationalism under leadership of the Inkata party asserted itself. Golan'sindictment of the specious use to which the Shaka myth has been put byambitious partisans, particularly the IFP, points out that effectualmanipulation of the myth has occurred and suggests who the manipulatorshave been. 13) to the good offices of a native colonial magistrate inSouthern Rhodesia. . On thataccount, when encountering three conflicting versions of Shaka's life, heprivileged the version of the oldest raconteur, who "takes a deep interestin these matters, and . Ritter's determinedly uncritical use and incorporation ofcolonial/European textual resources presents a problem for the reliabilityof his account of Shaka's life, or at least of the conclusions that hedraws based on those resources. Fluentin Zulu language, Ritter became a native-affairs civil servant in Rhodesia;his forebears had been missionaries, soldiers, and British colonial civilservants in South Africa. It perhaps ought to be rememberedthat, although Shaka died in 1828, the British colonialists did not defeatthe Zulu empire decisively until 1879 (Golan, 1994, p. Buthelezi publicly declared that he couldnot guarantee Mandela's safety at the festival, and Mandela did not attend.But now the rivalry was between Zwethlini and Buthelezi, each declaring ontelevision that he and not the other was the true heir to the legacy ofShaka Zulu and the true meaning of Zulu nationalism. carried out his plan . But the moremarginalized it became, the more it sponsored all manner of so-called black-on-black ethnic violence: Inkatha intensified the process of inventing Zulu nationalism, creating a homogeneous Zulu identity built on the history of political consolidation under Shaka, focusing on heroism and manhood, and reconstructing a past of successful resistance to white rule (Golan, 1994, p. Stuart advocated the establishment of a department of anthropological science in each colony, with a carefully selected person heading each division. Characterizing Zulutradition in this way, emphasizing a nationalist identity reinforced by thepossession of weapons was, according to Golan, an aspect of "a process inwhich both Zulu and whites took part, each for their own interests" (1995,p. The way Hamilton handles the issue of some white colonialist accountsof Shaka and the Zulu per se is to suggest, not so much that they did notbring to the narrative enterprise certain biases and prejudices (which theyundoubtedly did), as that despite such biases they were obliged to functionas good-faith agents of information transmission. Ritter, late of his majesty's Natal Carbineers, a colonialregiment in South Africa that helped put down a 19 6 Zulu rebellion. . The European project of colonialism, inthe context of transformed opinions of and information about non-Westerncultures in the modern period, has met disrepute in all but the mostantiprogressive corners of popular imagination. This may notmean that truth is impossible to discern. And the Mau Mau uprisingpresented an example of ingrained and perhaps incorrigible black-Africanbarbarism ready to hand.Conclusion The picture of Shaka as a violent, possibly psychopathic tyrant mustbe set beside the picture of Shaka as extraordinarily charismatic leaderand Zulu identity consolidator. Shaka distinguishes himself as warrior in battle and graduallyconsolidates power by displacing or executing rivals, initially ostensiblyin service of Dingiswayo but increasingly and eventually on his ownaccount. . The latter are more as it were "scannable" in poetic terms,acquiring a certain systematic and formal structure. 1 -11). Hamilton (1998, p. The antique quality of Ritter's work, however carefully its oralsources might have been mined and his textual sources researched, isundeniable. . . First the physically imposing Shaka is honored by the chieftainDingiswayo with a special spear and appointment as a chief of the Zuluclan. Inventing Shaka: Using history in the construction ofZulu nationalism. . However, his presentation ofShaka's life seems to go far to explain the necessity of British colonialintervention in South Africa, as a mechanism of truncating bloodthirstyrivalry among the peoples of Natal. This may an instance of what Ritter in his introduction refers to asthe use of metaphor as well as reportage of fact in Zulu oral tradition,but it is difficult to credit how the details of the moment could have beenso accurately reported in the heat of the pressing moment. Ritter's evaluation of Shaka conflates the cultural, political,historical, and personal with the colonial in ways that reveal a distinctbias aimed at mounting a comprehensive critique of the "object," oralternatively, the "other." The death of Shaka is explained as theinevitable result of murderous policy, with the conspirators proclaiming anend to tyranny. They take a more narrow aspect of Shakaas their respective subjects. 125). The episodein which the outcast Shaka kills the leopard is the turning point thatinitiates the public myth of his extraordinary capability; it could becompared to the episode in Judges 14.5-6, when Samson kills the lion and soinitiates his own public myth. Mandela urged a race-blind integration of blacks and whites in SouthAfrica as a whole. Indeed, there appears to be no single content for the Shakamyth; it is something of a moving target. Mandela and Shaka also have a certain mythicstatus. 14 ) characterizes Ritter's book as abest-seller romance that mines the romance of the larger-than-life Shakawith the devices of the historical novel. Thisresearch will seek to identify the pattern of ideas informing each work aswell as the means by which the authors present those ideas, with a viewtoward understanding why so many different versions of Shaka's life haveachieved currency, not only with biographers and historiographers but alsowith politicians.Shaka: History, Biography, and Myth, Part 1: Ritter King Shaka was assassinated in what would become British South Africa1828. 2 ). Whether Stuart would have expectedthat knowledge to teach Western scholars something meaningful can only beinferred. The interests of the IFP lay in mobilizing and entrenching ameaningful political power base, backed up by the legitimated physicalpower. It remains to explain how and why it has occurred, with a viewtoward clarifying how, why, and for whose benefit it is occurring or matoccur in future. Viewing the decline and discrediting of European colonialism acrossthe 2 th century, one can see as inevitable the dismantling of apartheid inSouth Africa in the mid-199 s. GivenGolan's and Hamilton's scholarly treatments of the multiplicity of oralsources, as well as their respective critiques of contemporary textualaccounts of Shaka's life, the definitiveness with which Ritter describesShaka's being an unwanted child, the result of an accidental pregnancyduring a tribal sexual ceremony, the emotional pawn of loveless parents whocould not keep their passions in check, the fierce but powerless victim ofbullying and ostracism as a child is striking. Hamilton(1998) cites the violence surrounding Mandela's invitation to a 1994 ShakaDay celebration, just after the new South African government had made aland grant to the Zulus, a nationalistic people whose territory was insidethat of South Africa. According to Golan, Stuartembellished and improved on both oral histories and the tribute poetry(1994, p. If Hamilton's analysis is correct, the behavior of narrators of ShakaZulu history in earlier generations can be contrasted with the behavior ofsuch contemporary actors as the IFP and the apartheid power structure inthe 199 s that Golan describes. 118), a conclusion that is consistentwith an understanding of the encounter between blacks and whites a the timeof nascent colonialism in South Africa in the 183 s, again in 1879, whenthe Zulus were decisively subdued by the British (the Boers less so, as itturned out, until 1899), and again in the 199 s, as the transition out ofapartheid and into black-majority rule. One need not make a casefor Stuart as a political progressive as the term is understood in themodern period in order to see that not all colonialists would necessarilyhave been aggressively seeking to obliterate the colonized population. Terrific majesty: The powers of Shaka Zulu and thelimits of historical invention. The content of Zulu identity, however, does not necessarily coincidewith the content of the Shaka myth, chiefly because the myth has had somany fathers. Golan saysthat Buthelezi "mastered the use of 'traditionalism'" and presented IFP as"authentic" heir to Zulu identity and heritage. If Ritter's account of a generally cordial relationship between Shakaand the English traders who sought various concessions from him isaccurate, the IFP's creative nationalism flies in the face of facts.However, one reason that the IFP's nationalism could be successfully builtaround the figure of Shaka is the undeniable history and legacy of Europeancolonialism, both Boer and British, that was unleashed from the 183 sonward and that was hostile to black self-determination. 18-19), was the aid, both manifest and covert, that thedeclining apartheid regime gave the IFP with a view toward discrediting theANC on one hand and the very notion of stable black-majority rule on theother. Inevitably, therefore, the way King Shaka Zulu was writtenabout tells as much about the writer as about Shaka himself. 145; emphasis in original).If there is a patronizing tone to this view of the European encounter withblacks, and if there seems a presumption that it is the Natives who are tobe studied and the Europeans who are to be doing the studying, there isalso a tone of authentically disinterested curiosity about what addedanthropological knowledge can reveal. That suicide, which closes themain text of the book, in anticipation of a massacre of women and childrenin one of the many battles that followed the assassination, functions as apowerful bit of narrative that redeems the denouement following Shaka'sdeath. 146). Ritter's introductory chapters, including the account of Shaka'sbirth, have the form of an ethnography of Zulu life and custom. 358). . That is what shemeans when she refers to the connection between "invented traditions" and"imagined communities" and the instrumentality of the figure of Shaka inthe capacity of competing constituencies to elicit support of ideaspromulgated in his name. 121). In Ritter's hands, the extraordinary personality of Shaka evolves intothe extraordinary figure of a tribal tyrant, through the mechanism of themfcane, the name given to the series of wars in which Shaka displaced orslaughtered various indigenous peoples of the region in the name of a Zuluempire.. In particular, Hamilton expressesskepticism that there was as it were a vast colonialist conspiracy tomobilize white European opinion and scholarly expertise against the viewthat Zulu culture and Shaka had something to teach the world about thestrategies and limits of empire. Golan deals with the way Shaka's biographyhas been appropriated, especially in the modern period, as an instrumentsupporting various projects of political advantage, not merely regardingnationalist ethnicity and individual political prestige in particular butalso regarding the way in which historical, political, and other discoursesof expertise govern common understanding of South Africa. Together, the Boer War and theGreat War had revealed the delicate balance of political affairs in SouthAfrica in particular because whites turned out to be splintered inthemselves, just as tribally separated in their way as various blackAfrican peoples were in theirs. 15), and the story is off. . The intention has not always been matched by accomplishment, as well-publicized accounts of interethnic violence demonstrated in the 199 s. This is by no means a moral endorsement of the colonial record inSouth Africa, for especially in the Zulu rebellion of 1879, the means ofsocial control by the colonialists were more direct. Thus Ritter's conclusion that limited contacts outside thesphere of Natal would explain the absence of "an urge to progress. TheBritish colonialist agenda in Africa, imperialist as it was, could not becredibly compared to, say, the Lebensraum project of Germany in Russia. 5). The political rationale for IFP's power play lay in the legacy ofShaka as a mythic figure around which people could be mobilized. sought, by questioning the White men on every possible occasion, a way to raise the standard of his people, and their own indifference to his plans for tem distressed and angered him (Ritter, 1995, p. . He survived one assassination attempt, whichoccurred about the same time that land-hungry English traders attempted astratagem to acquire from him a deed of gift to Natal. On the other hand, Hamilton distinguishes between "Stuart'ssynthesized accounts of the reign of Shaka . Another involves positioning Buthelezi as the perceived heir of Shaka,from which position Buthelezi can exert control over KwaZulu-Natal. Capable as Shaka was in seizing power, shoring it up by wayof military savvy, and literally obliterating subsequent opposition, hecould never overcome what Ritter ultimately characterizes as a fundamentalinability to grasp certain cosmic truths. Hamilton suggests that British concern to seeissues from the native perspective can be connected to the pragmaticcolonialist wish to understand the perspective in order to be able to co-opt it or otherwise manipulate it with a view toward exerting effectiveadministrative control over the colonized and subjugated population (p.146). There is also the issue of Shaka as instrumental artifact, which mustbe evaluated with reference to real-world political verities. In thatregard, Hamilton (1998) adds that oral tradition within a culture is nomore incorrigible or unitary in presentation than its written counterpart.In other words, which account of a life to trust is bound to involve avalue judgment. In other words, whateverone may think of the retrospective construction of mythic resonance, aswell as its exploitation by IFP, for Shaka's imperialism, it makes sense asan instrument of political culture.Shaka: History, Biography, and Myth, Part 3: Hamilton Hamilton's book treats directly of the perception and elaboration ofShaka Zulu in history. But as Hamilton sees it, Stuart's bias, and major concern,was more in the vein of professional competitiveness. 13). 144). Ultimately his brother Dingane entered into a conspiracythat ended in his murder. However, if the genre ofRitter's book is considered a blood-and-thunder historical romance, then itis arguable that the depiction of Shaka's early life is in the vein of anarrative strategy in which the weakling, possessed of latent but powerfulundercurrent, emerges as a charismatic leader. Similarly, Golan (1994, p. More generally, Golan does not credit the factualreliability of oral histories and suggests that certain speeches thatresonate with identity politics of Africa may well be fabrications. heard them from his father" (Hamilton, 1998, p.144). written material in published versions of hisspeeches" (p. 25). to learn Westerntechniques, the rising Nguni people would have been overwhelmed by theradiant energy of Western Civilization" (Ritter, 1995, p. stress the importance of the oral tradition, they omit all mention of the changing nature of oral recording or of the variants in tradition in different parts of society, giving the impression that the oral tradition is a monolithic block of evidence, more accurate than written histories and reflecting the knowledge of the people (Golan, 1994, p. 14). Ritter's brief autobiographical sketch reveals much about theperspective he brings to Shaka Zulu. Britain in particular, which had fought WorldWar I to end German imperialism, could hardly reconstitute its colonialpolicies in toto, at least not in name. Not of royal blood, Buthelezihad long functioned as a political boss exercising de facto control of theroyal family and whose power was linked to perception of continuing rivalrybetween Mandela and Zwelithini. A perspective in which Europe(more exactly the Empire) was the hub extending spokes of concern elsewherein the world could not fail to influence the tone and design of thebiography. 5 ).It is possible to speculate that contemporaneous white recorders of oralhistories would have colored their accounts of encounters with Shaka inways calculated to foster white-colonial domination of the Zulu empire andindeed the whole of the Cape. Hamilton disagrees, at least in part. The first line of the main text cites "the mighty drama ofShaka's life" (1955, p. In response, and apparently to mend fences betweenZulu nationalists in the province KwaZulu-Natal and the nationalgovernment, the Zulu king Goodwill Zwelithini, a blood descendant of Shaka,invited Mandela to the festival. Next, and morecrucially, there is the evidence of what today would be called ethnicidentity politics arrayed against Zulu imperialism and a willingness on thepart of subdued peoples forced into assimilation with the Zulu or theremnant of "ethnically cleansed" peoples to articulate their negative viewsof Shaka. The task for the biographer or historian thus becomes one ofevaluating the evidence in a way that does justice to the truth of eventsas well as to the truth of Shaka's significance for the sense ofbelongingness that may be felt by the Zulu people as well as by otherAfrican peoples who aspire to a species of self-determination and mutualpositive regard as players in the global community. . Along the same lines, he urged the benefits of anthropologicalstudy over administrative disposition of the relationship between nativeSouth Africans and colonial authorities. . Meanwhile, tribal warfare begins again. The real problem, in Ritter'sview, is that the peoples of Natal simply are not equal to the task ofshaping a real civilization, as the white Europeans were. . Forexample, says Hamilton: Shaka was portrayed in the 182 s as a tyrant and even as an inhuman monster both by oral historians who supported him and by those who opposed him. At that time, South Africa was a remote frontier to those whosenotions of history, biography, politics, and mercantilism were bound to thewritten word. Nor did the IFP's nationalist articulations prevent IFP frombecoming politically marginalized in South Africa as a whole. Now James Stuart can be said to have had a colonialist perspective.Equally, he can be said to have had an agenda where the rationalization ofZulu and Shaka history was concerned. . As a logical proposition, assumingaffiliation with the nationalist line, this would have the effect ofaggrandizing the major recognized voice of Zulu nationalism (IFP) as wellas lend importance to IFP leader Buthelezi. Linked to his developing perception of the importance f greater knowledge of indigenous institutions was a desire to invest his researches with a coherent methodology, and to win the support of the scientific community. Lost in images of a united Zulu empire arrayedagainst encroaching Europeans, according to Golan, are such inconvenientfacts as the "internal splits among different ethnic groups and thestruggles between local chiefs an the royal house," before, during, andafter Shaka's lifetime. "Shaka's story wasforged in accord with the motifs for the story of a leader in a time ofrevolutionary transformation" (p. Rider Haggard's novelKing Solomon's Mines (p. 357).In 1828, when his mother Nandi died, grief overwhelmed Shaka, and in theensuing period he redoubled executions of men, women, and children whodispleased him for any reason. In that regard, it may be useful to cite the publication ofRitter's work in 1955 as against the well-known violent anti-British MauMau uprising in Kenya 1952. In assessing the actions of Shaka we must never overlook the fact that he lived in a social organization reflecting a stage in human development infinitely older than archaic Greece--say, at least 1 years BC. Zulu culture, by contrast, was transmitted and preserved viaoral tradition. There are ample accounts on the historicalrecord to support either judgment of the leader, or something of both atthe same time. 25). Or perhaps after all he was in what we should today call denialof his imperialist ethos. In the chapter on the way that the IFP has written about Shaka as aprecolonial imperial leader, Golan explains that the manifest effort tounify black-nationalist sentiment in South Africa around the toweringfigure of Shaka and bring it under the authority of IFP is underpinned bylatent objectives that are the real reason for pointing to the symbol butthat are not loudly or unambiguously articulated. Another conclusion that Golan draws is that the mythic outlines ofShaka's story reveal much about contemporary Zulu values and socialorganization, particularly. Indeed, Mandela's political fate at theclosing of British colonialism in Africa in the 199 s can be favorablycompared to Shaka's fate in the 182 s, when British colonialism was in theprocess of being constructed. Shaka was a "barbarian," which was, by lights of Mr.Stuart, a step up on the continuum of civilization in the Edwardiancolonialist imagination (Hamilton, 1998, p. The concern to insert acorrective characterization can be interpreted as Stuart's method ofattempting, to the extent possible as he was an exponent of his culture andsociety, to arrive at a judgment in ethical terms. That comment could be interpreted not as an instance of ethnocentrismand merely as a time-line service to the reader, were it not so obviousthat Ritter presumes his readers' complete time-sensitive familiarity withas it were the achievements of English military history. . One Zulu tradition that seems to have beenbacked up by fact is Shaka's adherence to a tradition that the heir to theZulu throne would not necessarily be via primogeniture but instead based onthe ability of the strongest heir to seize power. "The whole [study, he said] should be presented from the Native point of view, indeed, the Native standpoint." Stuart's desire to see his "Idea" translated into a formal project was not motivated by practical concerns alone. Hamilton (1998) notes that some commentators have branded Fynn'sdiary as a forgery, neither truthful nor contemporaneously written, as wellas possibly heavily edited by James Stuart, a late-nineteenth-centurycolonial official not unsympathetic to the Zulus but nevertheless committedto subsumption of African tribalism in the colonial system. Duringthe fight against apartheid, Buthelezi had been a member of the ANC and anally of Mandela. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Citing Bryant as hissource, Ritter explains: He . Such incidents need not be used to declare Mandela's achievement andthe dismantling of colonial structures and apartheid a failure, foremerging nation-states around the world and throughout history have hadproblems in their formative years. The formerreveal the agenda, method, and biases of the professional scholar at work,according to Hamilton, while the latter more or less enable the Africans toexpress themselves freely. Nevertheless, the native voices ineluctably appear to have acquired alife of their own. Hamilton refers to James Stuart in particular. 3) for some 17 years. We have seen that Buthelezi is not a member of the Zuluhereditary royal house but IFP leader whose black-nationalist project hasbeen variously arrayed against and in collusion with apartheid and the ANCregime alike. On this view, the symbol of Shaka could be enlisted as a figurearound which the idea of reposing meaningful power with highly partisanblacks could be organized. He resigned the service in 1913 to engage in whathe describes as "exploring," from the Cape area north toward the equator.He continues, in explanation of his use of oral-tradition sources for hisbiography of Shaka: Great was his [Ritter's] joy to find, here and there, a few aged ring- headed indunas (headmen) who still spoke the Zulu tongue and were the ruling aristocrats in a sea of alien tribes conquered by their fathers (Ritter, 1995, pp. What must be pointed out is that Ritter declares his book a work ofserious history. . She cites two separate efforts by JamesStuart: his transcription of oral histories of Shaka among various SouthAfrican peoples and his renditions of izibongo, or so-called praise poems,i.e., paeans to Shaka and Zulu heritage. Part of that can be seen inthe description of Shaka's deliberate decision to go about unclothed toshow the strength of his manhood and to befriend those who were kind to himand his mother while being vengeful toward those who were not. "Inthe 198 s," says Golan, "ethnic differences, which were emphasized andexacerbated by the apartheid regime, were manipulated by Inkatha in itsstruggle for control over the African townships" (p. The effect of all of this is to perceive Shaka as a primitive hero-turned-psychotic ruler whose assassination was to be expected and even madenecessary so that the Zulu people could reassess their position and perhapsaspire to the next stage of civilization. 4 1). Ritter, E.A. A feature of such oral histories as were collected byrelatively neutral transcribers that emerges irrespective of proven orinferred Western prejudices is that Zulu and other black transmitters ofShaka history in the oral tradition appear not to have had either a unitaryor a nationalist agenda in mind vis-а-vis colonial administration whenarticulating their accounts of Shaka and the building of the Zulu empire--at least not until the 192 s. . Hamilton also suggeststhat Stuart was very concerned about accuracy in identifying the authentichistory of Shaka; in that regard, Stuart credited an account based on itsprovenance, especially its proximity in time to the actual events. Further, he and came toa host of dispositive conclusions about the Zulus in general and Shaka inparticular that could only have been written by a European. It is a historiography of the Shaka Zulu myth thattakes as its principal thesis the view that both white and blackconstructors of Shaka discourse may have had agendas that informed theshape that their histories and biographies took, but that the ultimateshape of the Shaka myth was not overdetermined culturally. Writing at the time of the finalobliteration of apartheid in South Africa, she seeks to identifyperceptions of Shaka held by rival constituencies in that country. The "traditional weapons" issue is one example of this. Describing anthropology as "the Queen of the Sciences" . Zulu history, indeed, is explained in terms of European history;Shaka came to the Zulu throne, says Ritter, "the year after Waterloo" (p.17). Thus she cites thedistinction made by James Stuart between Shaka as a "savage," which hadbeen Fynn's designation, and his own view that this was amischaracterization. Hamilton, C. . Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Reinner Publishers. (1998). The interests of the whiteswere not unconnected to this, to the degree the perception of a well-armedand mobilized black constituency could have the effect of discouragingwhite support for the smooth and stable transition of power from minorityto majority rule, not least because of the diffusion of myriad interestsand constituencies. It does mean that constructing oraccepting a version of truth about a life, particularly one that has themythic resonance of Shaka, is best grounded in as much evidence as possibleand rigorous, consistent method rather than a body of belief, assumption,or predisposition. But in the modernperiod, there seems a far greater need to control the discourse, not merelyas a means of asserting nationalist pride (whether the history isfactitious or not), but also as a means of asserting control over thehearts and minds of public imagination. The oral histories that provideinformation about what happened, she explains, are on her reading lesslinear and systematic in presentation at the source. (1994). However, there are two reasons for acceptingHamilton's analysis. . What is now known of the history ofRhodesia (Tanzania), South Africa, and much of the rest of the Third Worldthat ensued from the 196 s onward--barely a decade after first publicationof Ritter's book--is not remotely hinted at by Ritter, who appears to havethought the British colonial apparatus would endure uninterrogated inAfrica, whatever its fate had been in India. Zulu architecture had, for instance, not risen above huts made of a lattice-work of laths covered with thatch. (1955; 1995). They therefore betraymore evidence of idiosyncratic personalities than of the transcriberthereof. But set beside the work of Hamilton and Golan (forexample), Shaka Zulu cannot be considered a piece of serious scholarship.The critical attitude and temperament toward European sources are simplynot present. This appears to have alarmed the king'suncle, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, a leading Zulu nationalist and goad ofMandela's African National Congress party. Ritterappears to have felt no need to justify or defend the colonial project; itwas and remained the given situation for him. Also, Golan notes that the IFP is oneamong many constituencies, from European missionaries to the Zulu royalfamily, involved in constructing Zulu-history discourse as a history ofempire for its own purposes. But theattitude, which has the effect of privileging the colonial project inAfrica, is not so much stated as implicated in the presentation. 5). . But that story could not be told without alsofiltering it through the presumptions of the superiority of the Westernturn of mind and Western social structure. But whereas the myth of Mandela--gifted and extraordinary leaderand soul as he is--may not crystallize for some years, the myth of Shaka,as Hamilton points out, has retained the power to mobilize "Zulu identity"(1998, p. However, Buthelezi also had a record of infighting withmany black political allies, and in the waning days of apartheidarticulated support for the white regime in order to shore up support forIFP's political hegemony over black political life in KwaZulu-Natal. and his notes ofconversations with informants on the same topics" (p. But Shaka isdesignated an incorrigible primitive, unable to grasp scientific accountsof the cosmos. To begin with, both books arescholarly rather than popular texts, far more extensively documented thantheir popular-market predecessor. . Ritter describes Shaka's war making in terms of empire building,"whereas most of the leaders of the destructive tribal hordes weredesperadoes, intent solely on self-preservation" (p. However,IFP partisans also engaged in South Africa's political discourse in a waycalculated to lend special status to Zulu history and to the unique symbolof Shaka in that history. 358). She locates the work with literary andpoetic rather than scholarly sources, and she suggests that too many otherhistorians have relied on the works of Haggard and Ritter as reliablehistory. Shaka Zulu: The biography of the founder ofthe Zulu nation. The fact that this dynamic was organizedaround the charismatic figure of Nelson Mandela appears to have fosteredintentions to reshape governance bureaucracy and social structure in termsof reconciliation and transition toward stable and equitable politicalforms. London: Penguin Books. For purposes of this point, and accepting Hamilton's judgment ofmotives, Ritter's work on the Shaka myth would appear to have featuresmeant to locate African culture in general and the history of Zulu cultureand leadership in particular materially lower on the continuum ofcivilization. Golan continues: While Iknkatha textbooks . The formal break between Buthelezi and Mandela occurred in the early199 s, as South Africa prepared for transfer of power to black majorityrule. This research explores ways in which Shaka Zulu (1787-1828), an early-19th-century South African leader of the Zulu people, has been perceivedthroughout history. Supported by a white power structure that wanted toemphasize the instability that would ensue as a result of majority rule andintegration, IFP used the time to foment violence that was meant to ensurethat KwaZulu-Natal would not be collapsed into the new South Africa. . In that regard, Hamilton notesthat Ritter used his own observation and memory of family stories andmilitary campaigns as source material for the book. His own life is presented as self-consciously (and far from apologetically so) steeped in the colonialisttradition of popular imagination. The peculiar linkages between Zulunationalists and the white establishment, together with Zulu assertions ofspecial identity owing to its imperial legacy in Natal, point to a greaterreadiness in the modern period to appropriate Zulu history for politicalends. of the debate about the past andthe future of South Africa" (p. To the contrary, even where such viewswere held in administrative or scholarly colonial circles, there appear tohave been dissident, cautionary voices articulating precisely the oppositeview. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.