'A bit of this and a bit of that': an obituary for Elizabeth Colson

In describing her research among the Tonga of the Zambezi Valley, Elizabeth Colson said in an interview conducted on 11 April 2006 by Alan Macfarlane: 'Well, if you ask me about my own work, I have done a bit of this and a bit of that.'¹ The description must stand as the greatest understatement (if that is not a contradiction in itself) of an anthropologist's ethnographic scope and achievement. It contrasts with Bronislaw Malinowski's early confident reach for academic domination (1967) – but then she did not admire him or his theories.

Elizabeth worked among the Tonga people of Zambia over a period of seventy years (1946 to 2016), initially with the Plateau Tonga and then among the Gwembe (or Valley) Tonga of the Zambezi Valley, almost entirely on the Zambian side of the river.

Her magisterial ethnographic work encompassed almost every aspect of Gwembe Tonga society and traced the changes from settled agricultural life on the rich soils of the riverbanks to the despair of dislocation and the establishment of a new pattern of existence. The change was wrought by the drowning of their land and the loss for some 57,000 people of their homes, fields and resources when Kariba Dam was filled.

In 1956, she set out to trace the effects of the construction of the damming of the Zambezi River on them and, in 1971, she concluded:

Tonga lost their land when the waters of Lake Kariba swallowed it up. The people still mourn their loss although they have adapted to new environments. The Tonga had no part in the creation of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland or the decision to build a dam. They had no vote and no influence with political leaders who headed the federal and territorial governments.

Insofar as the majority understood what was happening, they regarded it as a theft of their land by powerful Europeans. They opposed the move, though the governmentappointed chiefs and councillors gave their formal approval to the scheme. They regard the period associated with the resettlement, lasting roughly from 1957 to 1962, as a time of troubles.

Only gradually did they recover from the shock of removal. (Colson 1971: 5)

Elizabeth's sober record of the profound dislocation of the people, their despair and resilience is invaluable. The fate of the Tonga on the Zimbabwe side of the river was worse.

It is in character that Elizabeth chose to work long term in a society that she described thus:

On the whole the Tonga might be defined as culturally a have-not group. They have never had an organised state. They were unwarlike and had neither regimental organisations nor armies. They were and are equally lacking in an age-grade set-up, secret societies, and social stratification of all kinds. The Tonga would not even have attracted those fascinated by the intricate rules of lineage or organisation, for while they have clans and smaller matrilineal kin-groups, they have them in a characteristically unorganised fashion which leaves the investigator with a baffled, frustrated desire to rearrange their social structure into some more ordered system. It is only in the rain-rituals that the Tonga show a half-hearted groping towards the establishment of a larger community than that which existed in the village or in the ties of kinship.

(Colson 1948: 272)

This account belies the fascination that the Tonga held for her in the patterns of their relationships; the value they placed on generosity, on obligations met and on clever trickery; on bravery in hunting elephant, hippo, rhinoceros and buffalo; their ritual attention to the ancestors; and their craftsmanship. She admired 'the emphasis on individual responsibility, and the general lack of dependence on specialized leadership [and saw it as] a characteristic feature of Tonga life' (Colson 1971: 237). She observed that 'Tonga interest in individualism goes hand-in-hand with an emphasis on a person's rights and obligations as a member of society' (ibid.). Her interest stretched from old men, who were more likely than old women to be accused of witchcraft...