Abstract
ABSTRACTOn 14 October 1999, Julius Kambarage Nyerere, the first president of the United Republic of Tanzania, died in a London hospital. In Tanzania, musical bands throughout the country reacted to the news by composing scores of lamentation songs(nyimbo za maombolezo)that mourned his passing and assessed his contributions to the country he helped to create. While elsewhere in the world Nyerere is affiliated with the ‘African socialist’ platform termedUjamaathat he theorized in his political writings and instituted during his tenure as president, these lamentation songs are notably silent on the topic of socialism. This silence indicates the ambiguity with which Tanzanians today relate to their socialist past. As a necessary prelude to analysis of thenyimbo za maombolezo,this article explores the practices, policies and values promoted in Tanzanian socialisms (mainland and Zanzibar) and in the postsocialist present. Competing rhetorics are revealed in these musical constructions of the ‘Father of the Nation’ and, by extension, the Tanzanian nation itself.
Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Subject
Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous),Anthropology,Geography, Planning and Development
Cited by
27 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献
1. Becoming Infrastructure;The City Electric;2022-11-18
2. Works Cited;The City Electric;2022-11-18
3. Notes;The City Electric;2022-11-18
4. The Ingenuity of Infrastructure;The City Electric;2022-11-18
5. The Flickering Torch;The City Electric;2022-11-18