Full Text Available
Note: Clicking the button above will open the full text document at the original institutional repository in a new window.
The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s
This dissertation investigates how photographs and photographic practices have both shaped and have been shaped by the political, cultural and performative demands of the project of postcolonial nation building in Zambia. Drawing on both visual and textual materials from the 1930s to the 1980s, coll...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Department of Historical Studies
2023
|
| Subjects: | |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1867613317735907328 |
|---|---|
| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo |
| author2 | Kar, Bodhisattva |
| author_browse | Kar, Bodhisattva Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo |
| author_facet | Kar, Bodhisattva Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo |
| author_sort | Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | This dissertation investigates how photographs and photographic practices have both shaped and have been shaped by the political, cultural and performative demands of the project of postcolonial nation building in Zambia. Drawing on both visual and textual materials from the 1930s to the 1980s, collected from the National Archives of Zambia as well as several private collections, including that of the Fine Art Studios in Lusaka, this dissertation attempts to understand the different ways in which critical attention to the role of the mechanically reproduced images can allow us to reconsider the given boundaries between the colonial and the postcolonial, the public and the private, and the nation and the individual. The first chapter explores the methodological possibilities and the archival limits of writing a social history of photography in Zambia that still remains largely undocumented. The second chapter sifts through thousands of images haphazardly stored in the National Archives of Zambia, reflecting on the shift from the ethnographic mode of observation in the late colonial period to the concerted imaging of developmentalist spectacles in the early postcolonial period. The focus of the third chapter is on the politics of official images of Kenneth Kaunda, the first president of independent Zambia. This dissertation combines uses of photographs, archival documents, semi-structured interviews and brief auto-ethnographic observations. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/37648 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:34:14.045Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2023 |
| publishDateRange | 2023 |
| publishDateSort | 2023 |
| publisher | Department of Historical Studies |
| publisherStr | Department of Historical Studies |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/37648 The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo Kar, Bodhisattva Historical Studies This dissertation investigates how photographs and photographic practices have both shaped and have been shaped by the political, cultural and performative demands of the project of postcolonial nation building in Zambia. Drawing on both visual and textual materials from the 1930s to the 1980s, collected from the National Archives of Zambia as well as several private collections, including that of the Fine Art Studios in Lusaka, this dissertation attempts to understand the different ways in which critical attention to the role of the mechanically reproduced images can allow us to reconsider the given boundaries between the colonial and the postcolonial, the public and the private, and the nation and the individual. The first chapter explores the methodological possibilities and the archival limits of writing a social history of photography in Zambia that still remains largely undocumented. The second chapter sifts through thousands of images haphazardly stored in the National Archives of Zambia, reflecting on the shift from the ethnographic mode of observation in the late colonial period to the concerted imaging of developmentalist spectacles in the early postcolonial period. The focus of the third chapter is on the politics of official images of Kenneth Kaunda, the first president of independent Zambia. This dissertation combines uses of photographs, archival documents, semi-structured interviews and brief auto-ethnographic observations. 2023-04-03T15:56:14Z 2023-04-03T15:56:14Z 2022 2023-04-03T15:31:11Z Master Thesis Masters MA http://hdl.handle.net/11427/37648 eng application/pdf Department of Historical Studies Faculty of Humanities |
| spellingShingle | Historical Studies Moronell, Sebastian Alfredo The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| title_full | The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| title_fullStr | The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| title_full_unstemmed | The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| title_short | The Visual Syntax of a Postcolony: Photographs in Zambia, 1930s – 1980s |
| title_sort | visual syntax of a postcolony photographs in zambia 1930s 1980s |
| topic | Historical Studies |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/37648 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT moronellsebastianalfredo thevisualsyntaxofapostcolonyphotographsinzambia1930s1980s AT moronellsebastianalfredo visualsyntaxofapostcolonyphotographsinzambia1930s1980s |