Not White Enough, Not Black Enough: Racial Identity in the South African Coloured Community, and: Walking a Tightrope: Towards a Social History of the Coloured Community of Zimbabwe (review)

The titles Not White Enough, Not Black Enough and Walking a Tightrope encapsulate the central arguments made by authors Mohamed Adhikari and James Muzondidya, respectively, that Coloured identities have been marked by their marginality and precariousness. Not White Enough, Not Black Enough argues that Coloured identities in South Africa remained relatively stable during the era of white domination, while Walking a Tightrope argues that Coloured identities in Zimbabwe went through major transformations between the post–World War II era and the period of political turmoil in the 1980s. Yet both authors proceed from the foundational premise that Coloured identity is "primarily... a product of its bearers" (Adhikari xiii).

The two texts agree on the historical forces that affected the formation of Coloured identities: that the ideology of assmilationism, the intermediate status of the Coloured group, the impact of negative stereotyping on Coloured peoples' self-concept, and political marginality have all played key roles in the shaping of Coloured identities. Adhikari sees these four elements as having "meshed to reproduce and stabilize [Coloured] identity through the twentieth century" (32). Adhikari uses a series of chronologically arranged case studies, drawn from the African Political Organization and the Educational Journal between 1909 and 1940; the Torch newspaper (produced by the Non-European Unity Movement) and Alex La Guma's novella A Walk in the Night between 1946 and 1963; and the Black Consciousness poetry of James Matthews and the newspapers South and Grassroots produced between 1970 and 1994. These case studies are subjected to rigorous scrutiny, and Adhikari comes to highly insightful conclusions.

Instead of simply rehearsing the received wisdom that activist movements, by their very nature, upset the status quo or radically question and depart from dominant ideologies, his analysis shows that even such renegades as the Non-European Unity Movement and the newspaper Torch did not always embrace nonracism. Rather than condemning the movements, however, he carefully documents and explains what he calls the "very considerable concessions the organizations made to various forms of racial thinking" (101). Through his perceptive explication of the factors that contributed to Coloured radicals' continuing adherence to "conventional perceptions and attitudes toward Coloured identity," he provides a credible explanation for why it is that "the postapartheid period has witnessed significant and swift changes in the way Coloured identity manifests itself" (162). Adhikari notes that the end of apartheid increased both the political clout and personal liberty and freedom of association experienced by Coloured people. Coupled with their interstitial position within a transforming South African racial hierarchy, these changes have led to rapid transformations in expressions of Coloured identity.

The true strength of Adhikari's text lies in the fact that he is unafraid to discuss—sensitively and perceptively—such uncomfortable issues as anti-African racism among Coloured people, and African chauvinism. Rather than simply trying to evade the historical roots of these racist sentiments or explain them away, he investigates them and provides an analysis of the structural changes that accompany such a shift in attitudes.

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Likewise, James Muzondidya's Walking a Tightrope seeks to unpack how structural changes in the economy and society, coupled with individual action, led Coloured people in Zimbabwe to develop ideologies and strategies to secure their economic and social position. Similar to Adhikari, Muzondidya is not an apologist for Coloured conservatives, nor does he seek to hide historical truths under a blanket of political correctness. Instead, his aim is to understand the "fluid, adaptive and situational nature of Coloured identity" (292).

Walking a Tightrope concentrates on the last half of colonial rule in Zimbabwe; it shows how Coloured identities, although responsive to state oppression...