Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | The Politics of the Body and the Politics of Control: An Analysis of Class, Gender and Cultural Issues in Student Politics at the University of Zimbabwe |
Author: | Gaidzanwa, Rudo B. |
Year: | 1993 |
Periodical: | Zambezia |
Volume: | 20 |
Issue: | 1 |
Pages: | 15-33 |
Language: | English |
Notes: | biblio. refs., ills. |
Geographic terms: | Zimbabwe Southern Africa |
Subjects: | political systems students Women's Issues Education and Oral Traditions Politics and Government Ethnic and Race Relations Education and Training politics Student behaviour University of Zimbabwe Power (Social sciences) |
External link: | https://journals.co.za/doi/abs/10.10520/AJA03790622_402 |
Abstract: | Based on her experience at the University of Zimbabwe as a student (1976-1978), as a sub-warden of a female residence (1979-1980), and as a lecturer since 1983, the author examines the social, political and cultural self-representations of the university's students. She pays particular attention to the management of these representations and some of the significant social and political events engineered by and affecting students. After briefly describing student politics before and after independence, the author looks at the differences in class, residential status, ethnicity and gender among students. She then discusses State-student interactions in the period 1990-1992, specifically in the context of issues pertaining to the University of Zimbabwe Amendment Act (1990) and the National Council for Higher Education Act (1990). The author notes that gender and class issues have been major factors in shaping student politics, both among the students themselves and in their confrontation with the State, as exemplified amongst others in the April-May 1991 boycott of classes and the 'miniskirt incident', in which a mob of male students attacked a black Zimbabwean model ostensibly because she was wearing a miniskirt. She concludes that the politics of intolerance have pervaded many aspects of university life and have led to the development of discourses couched in moral or other terms but centring in fact on control. Bibliogr., sum. |