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From Tsonga to Mozambicanidade

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From Tsonga to Mozambicanidade FROM TSONGA TO MOÇAMBICANIDADE: CIVIL RELIGIOUS DYNAMICS IN MOZAMBICAN NATIONALISM Samuel Joina Ngale Town Supervisor: Professor David Chidester Cape Thesis Presentedof for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of Religious Studies UniversityUNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN December 2011 The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgementTown of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Cape Published by the University ofof Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University ABSTRACT The relationship between the Romande Mission and the Liberation Front of Mozambique (FRELIMO) has been the subject of study by a number of Mozambicanists. Most of them agree that the Romande Mission played a key role in educating nationalist elites and in shaping political consciousness among the Africans. Notwithstanding the relevance of this approach, the current study argues that the Tsonga tribal and Mozambican national identities are civil religious constructs. They resulted from sacrificial ritual performances, the expropriation of traditions and symbols, and the creation of sacred spaces. Formed as a linguistic, cultural, religious and tribal unity, the Tsonga provided a historical genealogy and structural template for the emergence of Moçambicanidade as a civil religion. Drawing upon postcolonial theory and discourse analysis, the thesis uses the analytical category “civil religion” as a focusing lens in order to explore the dynamics of national solidarity in four main archival sources: First, the construction of the Tsonga narratives of the tiMhamba, the Sacred Woods and the expropriation of local traditions recorded in Henri-Alexandre Junod’s, The Life of a South African Tribe; second, the pedigree of a heightened value for union, Protestant work-ethics and education, bequeathed to Eduardo Mondlane and evident in his The Struggle for Mozambique; third, Jose Craveirinha’s deployment of religious and theological symbolism portraying the earliest signs of Moçambicanidade in Xigubo, Cela 1 and Karingana Wa Karingana; and, finally, the successful nation-building story signified by the Constitutional documents. Since the focus of the thesis is on productions of civil religion rather than their reception, evidence is drawn from textual analysis rather than from fieldwork methods. As a consequence of the analysis, the study argues that both Tsonga and Moçambicanidade are subaltern identities to modernity, perhaps destined to fail, but existing within the frame of modernity as its alter ego. By highlighting civil religious constructions of Tsonga and Moçambicanidade, the thesis hopes to shed new light and advance a discussion at the nexus of African religion and politics. i ACKNOWLEDGMENT To the most important women in my life, Maria Judite, Bearina Matata, Tanya Barben and Ann George for their unwavering support; to William and Amina Adam, my most helpful librarians at University of Cape Town; and to David Chidester who helped me walk the walk. ii DEDICATION To Joina T. Ngale and to his grandson Kaleb J.C. Ngale iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................................................................................... I ACKNOWLEDGMENT ............................................................................................................................................................... II DEDICATION .............................................................................................................................................................................. III TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................................................................................. IV CHAPTER ONE ............................................................................................................................................................................. 1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 PREFACE .................................................................................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1.1 RESEARCH DIVISIONS .......................................................................................................................................................................... 8 1.2 LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................................................................................................................................... 10 1.3 CIVIL RELIGION AND ITS CRITICS ....................................................................................................................................................... 15 1.4 CIVIL RELIGION AND THE SACRED ...................................................................................................................................................... 19 1.5 AFRICA AND CIVIL RELIGION ............................................................................................................................................................... 23 CHAPTER TWO ........................................................................................................................................................................ 31 THE PRODUCTION OF THE TSONGA ................................................................................................................................ 31 2.1 SCOPE OF THE TSONGA ......................................................................................................................................................................... 31 2.2 OF TSONGA: THE IMPACT OF THE CONCEPT ..................................................................................................................................... 36 2.3 JUNOD’S SCIENTIFIC INFLUENCES ....................................................................................................................................................... 42 2.4 THE ROLE OF LANGUAGE IN CREATING THE TSONGA ..................................................................................................................... 49 CHAPTER THREE ..................................................................................................................................................................... 57 CIVIL RELIGION AND THE TSONGA .................................................................................................................................. 57 3.1 TSONGA RITES OF PASSAGE ................................................................................................................................................................. 57 3.2 THE TSONGA RITES OF MHAMBA AND CIVIL RELIGION .................................................................................................................. 64 3.3 TRADITIONS AND CIVIL RELIGION IN THE MAKING OF THE TSONGA ........................................................................................... 69 3.4 CIVIL RELIGION IN THE SACRED WOODS ........................................................................................................................................... 74 CHAPTER FOUR ....................................................................................................................................................................... 82 THE EMERGENCE OF MOÇAMBICANIDADE ................................................................................................................... 82 4.1 THE PARADOXES OF MOZAMBIQUE AS A MODERN NATION........................................................................................................... 82 iv 4.2 THE SCHOOLS OF MOÇAMBICANIDADE .............................................................................................................................................. 89 4.3 PITFALLS OF NATION BUILDING ......................................................................................................................................................... 95 4.4 AESTHETIC REPRESENTATION ......................................................................................................................................................... 100 CHAPTER FIVE ...................................................................................................................................................................... 111 CIVIL RELIGION AND MOÇAMBICANIDADE ................................................................................................................ 111 5.1 FROM SACRED WOODS TO SACRED NATION.................................................................................................................................. 112 5.2 RELIGIOUS SYMBOLISM AND MOÇAMBICANIDADE ....................................................................................................................... 117 5.3 MOZAMBIQUE AS SACRED SPACE ..................................................................................................................................................... 123
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