Living with Mount Mabo povoados, land, and nature conservation in contemporary Mozambique Anselmo Matusse Supervisor: Professor Lesley Green Co-supervisor: Associate Professor Frank Matose Submitted to the School of African and Gender Studies, Anthropology and Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, University of Cape Town, in fulfilment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology University of Cape Town Date of submission: December 22, 2020 The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University of Cape Town Ângelo standing on the “neck” of Mount Mabo posing for a photo during a hunting journey COPYRIGHT The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non-commercial research purposes only. Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. ____________________________________ i DECLARATION ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I strongly believe that academic work is a collaborative endeavour connecting humans and nonhumans. And gift circulation is how I came to see the workings of such a collective. This thesis is, hence, a result of such gift circulation and is deeply indebted to that spirit of the gift. First, I want to say obrigado (lit. obligated) in the Portuguese sense of the word, meaning I am obligated to the people who gifted me their knowledge and time even when such things are becoming increasingly turned into commodities. There are many people and nonhumans that were crucial to the materialization of this project, and now I have that uncomfortable feeling of not being able to name everyone (or everything) that directly and indirectly helped me during this journey. The financial assistance of the National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, in collaboration with the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) towards this research (Grant #APS16/1048) is hereby acknowledged. Opinions expressed and conclusions arrived at are those of the author and are not necessarily to be attributed to the NIHSS and/or CODESRIA. I thank the National Research Fund—NRF (for the study grant in my first year of studies in 2016. I would like to thank the National Geographic Society for providing me their prestigious Early Career Grant in 2017 (#HJ-040ER-17) and allowing me to be part of their network. I thank the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) for providing me with a Dissertation Completion Grant in 2020 and with a vibrant network of African scholars with whom I had engaging conversations, and maintain that opinions expressed, and conclusions arrived at are those of the author and are not necessarily to be attributed to the organizations mentioned above. This is the same with the people I mention below. I would like to thank my supervisors Lesley Green and Frank Matose for providing me with an environment that enabled experimentation, constant dialogue, and freedom. They went the extra mile to see me through this entire process. Without their support and trust, this thesis would not have been materialized, nor my building of a voice. I thank Lesley Green in special for having pushed me and helped me keep in mind the bigger picture of why we do what we do. I am forever obligated. iii My PhD studies happened when student-led movements were calling universities in South Africa to transform and decolonise their curricula. I am thankful to that kind of political engagement that made me understand on a deeper level the implications of scholarly production in the global asymmetries and coloniality marking daily life of disenfranchised people. This movement shaped my methodological and epistemological orientations, and most importantly my view of life in general. There are people who were very generous with their gifts of wisdom that helped me improve my thinking and writing. I thank Andrew “Mugsy” Spiegel for his comments to this thesis. I thank him mostly for his intellectual generosity and guidance and for teaching me that engaged reading is also like a passear: it takes time, patience, and most of all love for knowledge production and sharing. I thank Anneli Ekblom for the generosity she showed in reading the whole draft and commenting on it and providing me tools to understand different articulations of local authority and debates about cultural heritage, archaeology, and history. I also thank her for inviting me to be part of the Archaeology Cluster’s discussions at the Uppsala University, where I met bright and generous human beings with an intellectual focus on Mozambique and southern Africa. One of those scholars was from Zimbabwe and told me that Mabo in Shona meant “stones”. A historical connection between the Mudimba clan of Nvava and Zimbabwe exists. For me that indicated a possible field of research in the future. I thank my wife Julia Matusse for being a patient and caring first-reader of my previous drafts. There were also people who shared their gifts with me in individual chapters. I thank Pierre du Plessis for his comments on the introduction of this thesis and chapter five. I also thank Vanessa Farr for her generous gifts on the politics around seeds and soil that helped me frame chapter five. I thank the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) collective for the workshops and engaged conversations about our work, specifically, Sarah Ssali and Jason Mosley for their encouragement and critique to chapter six. As Jason Mosely advised me now that you have reached this stage, it is important to build confidence and own your own voice. These words empowered me and continue resonating with me. iv When I set out to do my fieldwork, I believed it would be part of my and of other people’s lives, even though academic purposes drove my actions. In doing so, I met many people who helped me during my fieldwork. I would like to thank Calisto André and his beautiful family for hosting my wife and me at his home. Ms. Marta, his wife, always made sure we felt comfortable and at home. Their daughters helped us stay clean and fed. The young boys, Pires and Gonçalves, taught me some Manhaua. I always thought that Calisto was the Anthropologist and philosopher of his povoado. I learned so much from him that, if possible, I would add him as a co-author of this thesis. I would also like to thank mwene (lit.sing. traditional chief) of Nangaze, mwene Mpida Tacalanavo, mwene of Nvava, mwene Costa Moreno, and mwene of Limbue, mwene Adolfo Muracema for receiving me in their povoados and allowing my engagement with their worlds. I thank them for their wisdom and patience to interact with me. Like mwene Mpida asked me on our last day together as I was about to leave the fieldwork site: “don’t forget us!” I never did, and I never will. I had all of them in my mind throughout the entire writing process and hope my accounts do enough justice for the wealth of their knowledge and can help bring about the betterment of their living and dying conditions in an increasingly unfair and unequal one-world worlding. I would like to thank Eduardo André for hosting us in Nvava with his family and taking me with him to his hunting and cultivation excursions. I learned a lot from these experiences. I also thank Ângelo for saving a situation that seemed lost by allowing me to follow him in his hunting journey even when money was not guaranteed. The chapter on hunting was a result of his generous sharing of experiences. I would like to thank Djenguê and Ernesto André for the friendship and dialogues during my stay in Nangaze. I thank the secretary of Nangaze, Joaquim Malubanha for sharing his predicaments in the povoado with me and wish he may continue to live in strength in the company of his matoa and God. I was also fortunate to engage with local state bureaucrats to whom I send my thanks, such as the chief of Tacuane Post, Maria Elias Viegas, and the chief of locality of Limbue, Manuel Paca, for being cordial and helping me during my stay. I thank the Permanent Secretary, Daúdo Saíde Mamudo Jalilo, for the warm reception in Lugela. I thank the Director of District Services of Infrastructures, Arséno Nobre for the support and allowing Camisola to take the only district v motorbike and drive me to Limbue. I also thank him for the moments of conversation. I thank the Limbue’s chief of locality, Manuel Paca, for hosting Julia and I in his official residence. I thank Rosta Chume for receiving me in Lugela district when I did not know anyone and for helping me find accommodation and way into Lugela. I thank the anonymous taxi driver in Quelimane for advising me about how to be in the field, for suggesting I get “prepared”. His advice served as an entry point to my thesis. I thank Mawala, the truck driver, for helping me understand the social dynamics around doing business in the region. I thank the locality secretary Tomás. The Namadoe régulo Careca; I thank Amadeus, Carvalho, Sabonete, Bernardino, and the rest of the locals of Nangaze, Nvava, Limbue and Namadoe.