Suchergebnisse

In this paper, I recount my experiences with western media theory. Working on my PhD thesis marked my turn to decolonial theory. I used the creolisation strategy of putting critical western Marxist theories in conversation with African, black and Latin American decolonial theories. I worked on my PhD thesis under conditions informed by the Rhodes Must Fall (RMF), the Fees Must Fall (FMF) and other broader protests in South Africa whose connecting thread was the demand for the decolonisation of both the academy and public life. It is my conviction that, although work has already begun, there is still a lot of work to be done in decolonising the disciplines of journalism, media and cultural studies.

Ideological differences relating to the normative expectations of media performance in Zimbabwe have, historically, been at the heart of debates and struggles around press freedom and media activism. On one hand, political leaders, who lean towards nationalist politics, have accused the media and media activists who are mostly part of the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), of undertaking colonial work. In some cases, the private media have been characterised as running dogs of imperialism. On the other hand, media activists and journalists, have accused the government of limiting the space for meaningful engagement in media work through harsh laws and the arrests of journalists. These activists and journalists, ideologically located mostly in the terrain of a free market liberal understanding of media and politics, have also accused the government of using soft strategies such as starving private newspapers of government advertising and the huge revenue that comes with it. Former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has given as good as he has got in this ideological war. He has accused the private media of colluding with the Western media to tarnish the image of the country. In turn, he has been described as a media hangman. Using a combination of archival research and in-depth interviews with journalists, media activists and politicians, this paper gives a historicised account of this ideological struggle and seeks to engage with questions concerning the meaning of press freedom and media activism in Zimbabwe.

This volume uses post-/de-colonial approaches to examine subalternity in online media representations, specifically the intersectional subalternity of Matabeleland. The editors argue that in online spaces the liberatory politics of Matabeleland emerges as trapped in coloniality.

Klappentext: We are witnessing a worldwide resurgence of reactionary nationalist, religious, racist, and antifeminist ideologies and movements, as well as a rapid process of global de-democratization. Nevertheless, most studies remain tied to a methodological nationalism, while comparative research is almost exclusively limited to European countries and the USA. But authoritarian transformations in the Global South and the struggles against them have not only been at least as dramatic as in the North, they also often date back longer - and have been studied and theorized by Southern scholars for many years. Twenty scholar-activists from the Global South show in their in-depth studies how national processes of authoritarian capitalism have undermined political systems on a global scale.