|
Back to Index
Debating
Zimbabweanness in Diasporic Internet forums: Technologies of freedom
Winston
Mano & Wendy Willems
December 11, 2009
Download
this document
- Acrobat
PDF version (214KB)
If you do not have the free Acrobat reader
on your computer, download it from the Adobe website by clicking
here.
In: Zimbabwe's
New Diaspora: Displacement and the Cultural Politics of Survival
Edited by JoAnn McGregor and Ranka Primorac
Berghahn Books
The protracted
and multi-staged economic and political crises that visited Zimbabwe
in the 2000s were accompanied by politically charged, narrowed-down
definitions of national identity and citizenship. As many Zimbabweans
left for Britain, the USA, South Africa and other destinations,
so the Internet became an important multi-platform medium for publishing
and obtaining news about Zimbabwe. It could provide linkages between
Zimbabweans in different parts of the Diaspora and enabled them
to debate political and economic change. The burgeoning Diasporic
Zimbabwean media have primarily served the growing population outside
Zimbabwe but have also been accessible to some constituencies at
home, and have provided alternatives to the shrinking state-controlled
media space in Zimbabwe. Leading Diaspora websites such as SW Radio,
Zimdaily and New Zimbabwe have offered up-to-date news and provided
critical reflection on Zimbabwe's demise.
The Internet
has often been celebrated as a medium which enables those subject
to censorship to evade regimes of control. For example, de Sola
Pool (1983: 5) argues that '[f]reedom is fostered when the
means of communication are dispersed, decentralised, and easily
available, as are printing presses or microcomputers. Central control
is more likely when the means of communication are concentrated,
monopolised, and scarce, as are great networks'. The Internet
has been described as making possible a new form of cyberdemocracy
or as enabling a more inclusive public sphere.
(Poster 1997;
Tsagarousianou et al. 1998; Liberty 1999; Gimmler 2001; Papacharissi
2002; Dahlberg and Siapera 2007). Others have discussed the way
in which the Internet can threaten the power of authoritarian regimes
(Kedzie 1997; Kalathil and Boas 2003). In the context of Zimbabwe,
Peel (2008) has proposed that Zimbabwean Internet fora constitute
'a microcosm of Zimbabwean diversity which deconstructs the
authoritarian nationalism that has been a signature of Mugabe's
28-year rule'. However, against these positive celebrations
of the liberating potential of the internet, more sceptical observers
have highlighted the way in which the internet can also give a voice
to extremely reactionary perspectives such as those of the extreme
right and neo-Nazi white supremacists (Brophy et al. 1999; Adams
and Roscigno 2005; Atton 2006; Roversi and Smith 2008).
This chapter
considers the way in which national identity and citizenship were
debated within an online discussion forum on the Diaspora website
NewZimbabwe. It specifically focuses on discussions around the participation
of a Zimbabwean nurse, Makosi Musambasi, in the British Big Brother
series, broadcast on Channel Four in 2005. Via the 'Makosi
case', the chapter examines how Diasporic Zimbabweans defined
themselves and how they imagined 'Zimbabweanness' in
Internet chatrooms. Through the case study, the article discusses
the extent to which their imaginations can be seen as an alternative
to the narrow and exclusionary nationalism articulated by the ruling
ZANU PF government. The first part of this article provides a background
to the authoritarian nationalism espoused by the Zimbabwean government
in the 2000s. Subsequent sections address emerging Diasporic Zimbabwean
media and the specific case of NewZimbabwe, Makosi's entry
into the Big Brother house and the final section discusses online
discussion forum debates on 'Zimbabweanness'.
Download
the full document
Please credit www.kubatana.net if you make use of material from this website.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License unless stated otherwise.
TOP
|
