The Nucleation of White Zimbabwean Writing

Abstract

SummaryConsidering literature as a system in dialogue with non-literary systems, this article discusses the ways in which white writing in Zimbabwe finds itself marginalised from mainstream Zimbabwean literature owing to monological approaches which see the literary system as uniform, static and closed. Feeding from, and into, political, media and literary discourses on belonging, these approaches accomplish the nucleation of the system by imposing various forms of nuclei in the form of Rhodesian/colonial sensibilities and allegiances which white writing supposedly has. While it is true that some white narratives exhibit strong affinities towards the colonial past, it should also be noted that such narratives are only part of the system and resultantly the system should not in any way be reducible to this or any other segment. Enucleation is proffered as an alternative conceptualisation of the literary and cultural system in that it redeems systems from the demands of sameness and stasis. The place white writing occupies in Zimbabwe’s post-2000 cultural landscape, for instance, serves to illustrate how questions of memory and heritage always involve the intertwining of several cultural forces.