DIFFERENT VIEWS ON THE SUFFICIENCY OF TRADITIONAL MARRIAGES

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CHAPTER 3 THE NDAU PEOPLE OF CHIMANIMANI, ZIMBABWE

INTRODUCTION

Chapter 2 attempted, using several subtopics, to bring the contributions of scholars to the fore and to establish research gaps that this thesis aims to fill. The current chapter deals with the Ndau people of Chimanimani, Zimbabwe. Chapters 3 and 4 seek to give an orientation and/or some background to facilitate an understanding of the research findings chapters (Chapters 5 to 7). As emphasised in Chapters 1 and 2, Chapter 3 employs postcolonialism as the paradigm that undergirds the study. The chapter consists of three major sections. The first section is on the Geography and History of the Ndau People. The second is on Ndau Identities/Ndauness. The third major section focuses on Marriages. All the sections employ the use of different subheadings. At the onset, the chapter will consider the etymology of the name ‘Zimbabwe’, a brief history of the people of Zimbabwe in general, origins and meaning of the term ‘Gazaland’, and brief histories about Chimanimani and Chipinge. The following issues will be treated under Ndau Identities: Identity, Shona and Ndau, Ndauness, Reciprocity, Mbire and Rozvi, Mfecane, Shangaans, Ndau Common Suffering, Totems and Clans, and Chieftaincies. This section details how the Shona and Ndau came to be termed the Shona/Ndau. The same section presents aspects that have been associated with being Ndau: ear piercing, nyora (scarification), and pika (dots on several parts of women’s bodies). It shall be seen that Reciprocity has to do with the cultural borrowing between the Ndau and the people that they came into contact with, including but not exclusively the Shangaan. The third and final major section on Marriages focuses on Shona Marriages in General, Ndau Marriages in Particular, Roora, and Polygamy/Polygyny.

GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY OF THE NDAU PEOPLE

ZIMBABWE

Zimbabwe is a Southern African country among several others. The connectedness of Southern African countries, especially before colonialism, will be explored later in this chapter. Fig. 1 below shows some of the Southern African countries and the location of Chimanimani and Chipinge districts. A Concise Encyclopedia of Zimbabwe (1988: 1) mentions that, “The word ‘zimbabwe’ derives from the Shona zimba ramabwe (big house of stone). It appears in early documents as the name of royal residences. Great Zimbabwe is the most outstanding of such structures.”
It is important to note that much of the Ndau history that this chapter will explore occurred before the advent of colonialism. As noted, and will be established, colonial boundaries cut across people of the same backgrounds and cultures resulting in scenarios where the same people are to be found on two different sides of the international border. Such is the case with the Ndau people as this chapter shall show. The impression was given that there were concrete language and or dialect boundaries but this is not necessarily the case. According to MacGonagle (2007: 11, 13), “Missionaries and colonial officials drew language borders and demarcated dialect territories in many parts of Africa.”

PEOPLE OF ZIMBABWE

The people of Zimbabwe have a long history. The people that occupy Zimbabwe today are not the same people that were there around about 1000 CE. Numerous migrations, both immigrations and emigrations, have taken place in between. This fact further bolsters the assertion that the people of Southern Africa were intricately interconnected before colonialism.
Before the Bantu-speaking people invaded Zimbabwe, there existed the San tribe in Zimbabwe. The Bantu people are understood to have settled in Zimbabwe, coming from Tanzania around the eleventh century. These migrations continued for the next about five hundred years into the fifteenth century (Encyclopaedia Rhodesia, 1973: 363; Rayner, 1962: 20). There is implied here a close connection between Tanzania and Zimbabwe. The origins of the majority of people that populate Zimbabwe today can be traced back to Tanzania, therefore underlining the connectedness of the two countries in history.
It is important to define ‘Bantu’. According to Rayner (1962: 26), “The Bantu might be defined as all those ‘blacks’ who use some form of the root ntu for human being; with the plural affix this becomes ba-ntu (Bantu) i.e. the men (of the tribe), whence the term under which the whole great group has passed into anthropological literature.”
In the history of the people of Zimbabwe there were states ruled by different chieftaincies or dynasties. It is essential to consider chieftaincies in this thesis because chiefs were and remain custodians of culture, marriage cultural practices included. The most common ones are the Munhumutapa (Mwenemutapa/Monomotapa) and the Rozvi/Changamire states. These would dominate for some time until another state would rise and take over. The pattern would continue. The Rozvi state was disturbed by the inward migrations of the Nguni and Swazi at the end of the eighteenth century (Encyclopaedia Rhodesia, 1973: 363-364).
The nineteenth century was characterised by more invasions by people from South Africa. There were two powerful invasions from the south, one by the Shangaan and another by the Ndebele. The former occupied the Eastern Highlands in Chimanimani, Zimbabwe, while the latter was in Matabeleland. The people called ‘Ndebele’ today left Natal in 1822 and settled in Matabeleland at last (Encyclopaedia Rhodesia, 1973: 364; Isichei, 2004: 8). The first of these two invasions is much more important to this study because it affected the Chimanimani District that this thesis focuses on. More will be said about ‘the Shangaan’ later in this chapter.
Today two main ethnic groups exist in Zimbabwe: the Shona and the Ndebele. That these two are the main ethnic groups does not make them the only ethnic groups in Zimbabwe. The Tonga, Kalanga, Sotho, Venda and Hlengwe are other minority people groups in Zimbabwe. Unlike the rest, the Tonga are a matrilineal group of people (Concise Encyclopedia of Zimbabwe, 1988: 40; Weinrich, 1977: 48). The Ndau, as will be demonstrated, fall under ‘the Shona’ together with other Shona dialectical groups.
As indicated, the two main ethnic groups, the Shona and the Ndebele, can be said to be two main groups of Bantu speakers. While this chapter will concentrate on the Ndau who are part of the Shona group, it should be noted that the Ndebele are also a significant population in Zimbabwe. The Ndebele are descendants of Mzilikazi and his followers who, like the Shangaan, also fled from Shaka (A Concise Encyclopedia of Zimbabwe, 1988: 41). More information will be provided about the mfecane later on in the chapter.

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION AND GENERAL ORIENTATION TO THE STUDY
1.1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION
1.2 AREA OF INVESTIGATION
1.3 RESEARCH PROBLEM AND RESEARCH QUESTION
1.4 JUSTIFICATION
1.5 AIM OF THE STUDY
1.6 OBJECTIVES
1.7 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
1.8 DATA COLLECTION METHODS
1.9 SAMPLING
1.10 DATA ANALYSIS
1.11 DATA VERIFICATION
1.12 ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS
1.13 CLARIFICATION OF KEY TERMS AND/OR CONCEPTS
1.14 STRUCTURE OF THE THESIS
1.15 CONCLUSION
CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 INTRODUCTION
2.2 AFRICAN INDIGENOUS RELIGIONS AND WORLDVIEWS
2.3 NDAU ETHNIC IDENTITIES
2.4 MARRIAGE
2.5 MISSIONARIES IN ZIMBABWE
2.6 LAWS
2.7 PROBLEMATIC AREAS
2.8 CONCLUSION…78
CHAPTER 3THE NDAU PEOPLE OF CHIMANIMANI, ZIMBABWE
3.1 INTRODUCTION
3.2 GEOGRAPHY AND HISTORY OF THE NDAU PEOPLE
3.3 NDAU IDENTITIES/NDAUNESS
3.4 MARRIAGES
3.5 CONCLUSION
CHAPTER 4SOUTH AFRICA GENERAL MISSION (SAGM) MISSIONARIES
4.1 INTRODUCTION
4.2 MISSIONARIES IN AFRICA IN GENERAL
4.3 MISSIONARIES’ WORK IN ZIMBABWE
4.4 SOUTH AFRICA GENERAL MISSION (SAGM)
4.5 SAGM MISSIONARIES’ ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE NDAU AND THEIR CULTURE
4.6 NDAU PEOPLE’S ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE MISSIONARIES
4.7 MISSIONARIES AND IMPERIALISM
4.8 CONCLUSION
CHAPTER 5RESEARCH FINDINGS AND LITERATURE CONTROL – PART 1
5.1 INTRODUCTION
5.2 BIOGRAPHICAL PROFILE OF THE PARTICIPANTS
5.3 THEMES EMERGING FROM THE DATA
5.4 THEME 1: MARRIAGE PRACTICES AMONGST THE NDAU PEOPLE
5.5 CONCLUSION OF THE CHAPTER
CHAPTER 6RESEARCH FINDINGS AND LITERATURE CONTROL – PART 2
6.1 INTRODUCTION
6.2 THEME 2: MOST PREFERRED WAY OF MARRIAGE AMONGST THE NDAU PEOPLE
6.3 THEME 3: VARIOUS REASONS FOR HAVING A WHITE/CHURCH WEDDING AFTER TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE
6.4 THEME 4: PERCEIVED RELATIONSHIP BETWEENi TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE RITES AND CHRISTIAN MARRIAG
6.5 THEME 5: DIFFERENT VIEWS ON THE SUFFICIENCY OF TRADITIONAL MARRIAGES
6.6 CONCLUSION OF THE CHAPTER
CHAPTER 7RESEARCH FINDINGS AND LITERATURE CONTROL – PART 3
7.1 INTRODUCTION
7.2 THEME 6: THOUGHTS ON THE EXPENSES OF CHURCH WEDDINGS
7.3 THEME 7: HOW PARTICIPANTS MARRIED AND REASONS THEREOF7.4 CONCLUSION OF THE CHAPTER
CHAPTER 8SUMMARIES, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
8.1 INTRODUCTION
8.2 SUMMARY OF CHAPTER 1
8.3 SUMMARY OF CHAPTER 2
8.4 SUMMARY OF CHAPTER 3
8.5 SUMMARY OF CHAPTER 4
8.6 SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS 5-7
8.7 RECOMMENDATIONS BASED ON RESEARCH FINDINGS
8.8 CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY
GET THE COMPLETE PROJECT
GETTING MARRIED TWICE: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN INDIGENOUS AND CHRISTIAN MARRIAGES AMONG THE NDAU OF THE CHIMANIMANI AREA OF ZIMBABWE