Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T05:06:46.129Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Children of tribulation: the need to heal and the means to heal war trauma

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 December 2011

Pamela Reynolds
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

This article is about the unseen world of war—the unrecorded consequences for children of large-scale horror. There are two parts to it. The first is on the need for healing: it is an account of children's suffering during Zimbabwe's War of Liberation and their part in the fight for freedom. The second describes the means for healing: it examines how traditional healers (n'anga) provided opportunities through ritual for reconciliation and the soothing of individual trauma.

Résumé

Les enfants de la haine: pourquoi et comment soigner les traumatismes laissés par la guerre

L'expérience des enfants—à la fois victimes et participants—lors de la guerre d'indépendance du Zimbabwe est souvent ignorée. Tout comme le sont les conséquences, à l'issue de la guerre, pour les enfants traumatisés par ces expériences. Cet article nous les décrit, en citant des cas extraits de textes qui figurent intégralement en annexe. La deuxième partie de l'article dépeint les tentatives des guérisseurs traditionnels pour permettre aux enfants (et aux adultes) de surmonter le traumatisme engendré par la guerre.

Type
The social wounds of war
Information
Africa , Volume 60 , Issue 1 , January 1990 , pp. 1 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1990

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Bourdillon, M. F. C. 1984–1985. ‘Religious symbols and political change’, Zambezia 12: 39–54.Google Scholar
Bourdillon, M. F. C. 1987. ‘Guns and rain: taking structural analysis too far’, Africa 57 (2): 263–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bourdillon, M. F. C. and Gundani, P. 1988. ‘Rural Christians and the Zimbabwe Liberation War: a case study’, in Hallencreutz, C. F. and Moyo, A. (eds.), Christianity South of the Zambezi, vol. Ill: Church and State in Zimbabwe, pp. 147–61. Gweru: Mambo Press.Google Scholar
Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace. 1977. Rhodesia: the propaganda war. Salisbury: Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace.Google Scholar
Cilliers, J. K. 1985. Counter-insurgency in Rhodesia. Dover, NH: Croom Helm.Google Scholar
Frederikse, J. 1982. None But Ourselves: masses vs. media in the making of Zimbabwe. Johannesburg: Ravan.Google Scholar
Hannan, M. 1984. Standard Shona Dictionary, revised (3rd) edn with addendum. Harare: College Press for the Literature Bureau.Google Scholar
Harris, G. G. 1978. Casting Out Anger: religion among the Taita of Kenya. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
J. Z. Moyo Social History Project. Forthcoming. So That Our Youngsters Will Know. Harare: Baobab.Google Scholar
Krige, Norma. 1988. ‘The Zimbabwean War of Liberation: struggles within the struggle’, Journal of Southern African Studies 14(2): 304–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lan, David. 1985. Guns and Rain: guerrillas and spirit mediums in Zimbabwe. Berkeley and London: University of California Press, and James Currey.Google Scholar
Moore-King, Bruce. 1988. White Man Black War. Harare: Baobab.Google Scholar
Pongweni, A. J. C. (ed.). 1982. Songs That Won the Liberation War. Harare: College Press.Google Scholar
Ranger, Terence. 1985. Peasant Consciousness and Guerrilla War in Zimbabwe: a comparative study. Harare: Zimbabwe Publishing House.Google Scholar
Taussig, Michael. 1987. Shamanism, Colonialism and the Wild Man: a study in terror and healing. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
UNICEF. 1989. Children on the Front Line: the impact of apartheid, destabilisation and warfare on children in Southern and South Africa (third edn). New York: UNICEF.Google Scholar