The Unbearable Whiteness of Being

Cover

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Title Page, Copyright

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Contents

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pp. v-vi

Acknowledgements

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pp. vii-viii

The research, writing and completion of this book has been aided by a community of people and institutions to whom a great deal of gratitude is extended. By far the largest proportion of that thanks is reserved for Professor Ian Phimister. It is no overstatement to say that without his support, guidance and counsel, ...

List of Acronyms

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pp. ix-

List of Tables and Map, List of Arrpendices, A Note on Currency

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pp. x-

Foreword

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pp. xi-xiii

One of the most difficult challenges confronting post-colonial societies in southern Africa which had a resident white population is how to redress the inequalities of inherited land ownership and distribution. Consequently, the governments of Zimbabwe, Namibia and post-apartheid South Africa ...

Introduction: Why the Voices of White Farmers?

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pp. 1-10

If Karenin had been a person instead of a dog, he would surely have long since said to Tereza, ‘Look, I’m sick and tired of carrying that roll around in my mouth every day. Can’t you come up with something different?’ And therein lies the whole of man’s plight. Human time does not turn in a circle; it runs ahead in a straight line. ...

1. White Farmers & their Representatives in Zimbabwe, 1890–2000

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pp. 11-42

To say the fast-track land reform programme initiated by the Zimbabwean government in 2000 has had a dramatic effect on the country’s political, economic and social landscape since goes beyond stating the obvious. The devastating effects of these reforms and the manner in which they have been carried out has produced ...

2. No Country for White Men: White Farmers, the Fast-Track Land Reforms and Jambanja, 2000–2004

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pp. 43-66

The increasing hostility of ZANU-PF – which was exacerbated by the rising popularity of the MDC – meant that white farming communities entered the new millennium in a cautious manner. Unsure of how the land issue would develop, many farmers became active participants in the political upheavals around them. ...

3. Discourses of Apoliticism in The Farmer

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pp. 67-116

This chapter and those that follow focus on the experiences and discourses of white farmers as expressed in written and oral form. The core findings are based on a detailed reading of memoirs and autobiographies (Chapter Five), and on extensive interviews with white farmers still residing in Zimbabwe (Chapter Six). ...

4. Discursive Thresholds & Episodes of Crisis: The Liberation War, Gukurahundi & the Land Occupations

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pp. 117-148

The Farmer magazine played a central role in framing and constructing the political interactions of farmers. It was used as a vehicle for the union to speak to and for the community, and the community relied on it as an avenue of communication with the union. Although the degree to which the magazine performed ...

5. The Consolidation of Voice: White Farmers’ Autobiographies & the Narration of Experience after 2000

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pp. 149-186

This chapter looks at memoirs written by white farmers since 2000. They are one of the key ways that the farmers have chosen to relate the ordeals they have been through, and as a result provide an insight into their understandings of place, race and belonging within Zimbabwe. Such understandings of the past have ...

6. Orphans of Empire’: Oral Expressions of Displacement & Trauma

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pp. 187-213

This book has sought to explore the ‘authentic’ voice of white farmers, to which the interviews provide a further point of access. This voice, however, is not treated as the spontaneous voice that is the implicit subject of much oral history research in Africa. Nor is it the presentation of disempowered ...

Appendix 1. CFU structure & list of past presidents

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pp. 214-216

Appendix 2. Land use on large-scale commercial farms & area under cultivation in hectares, 1970–1999

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pp. 217-

Appendix 3. Summary of major crop sales in $Z millions, 1970–1999

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pp. 218-

Appendix 4. The number of large-scale commercial farms & the total area occupied in hectares, 1970–1999

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pp. 219-

Appendix 5. White farmers killed between 1964–79, 1981–87 and 2000–04

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pp. 220-227

Appendix 6. Date of purchase on the title deeds of farming properties listed in the 1997 acquisition list

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pp. 228-

Appendix 7. Biographical data on white farmers interviewed

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pp. 229-236

Bibliography

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pp. 237-256

Index

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pp. 257-265

Epigraph

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pp. 266-

This really happened when I was back visiting the old man who lived across the road from my mother in my home town of Ninety Six, South Carolina. J. Hilton Lewis was his name. While I was there two other men, who I also knew well, drove up. As they approached us, they asked Hilton if he had heard about the murder. ...

Back cover

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