Pastimes and politics : culture, community, and identity in post-abolition urban Zanzibar, 1890-1945 / Laura Fair.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Fair, Laura.

Series:

Eastern African studies (London, England)

Eastern African studies

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Ethnicity.

Leisure.

Group identity.

Identity (Psychology).

Popular culture.

Zanzibar--Social life and customs--20th century.

Zanzibar.

Popular culture--Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Identity (Psychology)--Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Group identity--Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Leisure--Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Ethnicity--Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Tanzania--Zanzibar.

Physical Description:

xvi, 370 pages : illustrations, maps. ; 22 cm.

Place of Publication:

Athens : Ohio University Press ; Oxford [England] : J. Currey, 2001.

Summary:

The first decades of the twentieth century were years of dramatic change in Zanzibar, a time when the social, economic, and political lives of island residents were in incredible flux, framed by the abolition of slavery, the introduction of colonialism, and a tide of urban migration. Pastimes and Politics explores the era from the perspective of the urban poor, highlighting the numerous and varied ways that recently freed slaves and other immigrants to town struggled to improve their individual and collective lives and to create a sense of community within this new environment. In this study Laura Fair explores a range of cultural and social practices that gave expression to slaves' ideas of emancipation, as well as how such ideas and practices were gendered. Pastimes and Politics examines the ways in which various cultural practices, including taarab music, dress, football, ethnicity, and sexuality, changed during the early twentieth century in relation to islanders' changing social and political identities. Professor Fair argues that cultural changes were not merely reflections of social and political transformations. Rather, leisure and popular culture were critical practices through which the colonized and former slaves transformed themselves and the society in which they lived. Methodologically innovative and clearly written, Pastimes and Politics is accessible to specialists and general readers alike. It is a book that should find wide use in courses on African history, urbanization, popular culture, gender studies, or emancipation.

Contents:

Zanzibar History, Slavery, and Abolition 10

Culture and Community in Urban Zanzibar 20

Ethnicity, Identity, and Belonging 28

Being and Becoming an Arab: Citizenship, Consumption, and Race 41

Chapter 2. Dressing Up: Clothing, Class, and Gender in Post-Abolition Zanzibar 64

Dress, Class, and Ethnicity in the Nineteenth Century 67

Dressing Up: New Identities and New Clothes 74

Islam, Veiling, and Respectability 85

Gender, Politics, and Cultural Change 96

Chapter 3. "The Land Is Ours! Why Should We Pay Rent?": Land, Law, and Housing in Colonial Ng'ambo 110

From Kiungani to Ng'ambo 113

Hut Tax, Ground Rent, and Resistance to World War I 129

Transformations in Urban Land Tenure and the Early Years of Ground Rent in Ng'ambo 133

Growing Tensions over Ground Rent 140

The Ground Rent Strike of 1928 148

Chapter 4. The Music of Siti binti Saad: Creating Community, Crafting Identity, and Negotiating Power through Taarab 169

Taarab and the Creation of a Zanzibari Identity 171

Background on the Band and the Role of Religion in Their Rise to Fame 175

The Creative Context of Siti's Songs 182

Continuity and Change in the Constellations of Colonial Power 185

Gender and the Colonial Courts 195

"When you wanted me I stayed with you / Now you do not want me I have no need for you": Love, Sex, and Rejection between the Wars 209

Chapter 5. Colonial Politics, Masculinity, and Football 226

The Early Years of Football in Zanzibar 228

The Politics of Sport in Colonial Zanzibar 240

Ethnicity, Nationalism, Masculinity, and Community: The Multiple Meanings of Football in Island Life 248.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [335]-364) and index.

ISBN:

0821413848

0852557957

082141383X

OCLC:

45916487