Life of Shaka Zulu

The gradual, complex, event-filled, and sometimes violent dismantling of the European colonial apparatus over the course of the 20th century can sometimes conceal the fact that the history of Africa is not confined to the history of Europe in Africa. The European project of colonialism, in the context of transformed opinions of and information about non-Western cultures in the modern period, has met disrepute in all but the most antiprogressive corners of popular imagination. Indeed, the handwriting was on the wall for the colonial powers in Africa as early as 1918, in the aftermath of the Great War. Britain in particular, which had fought World War I to end German imperialism, could hardly reconstitute its colonial policies in toto, at least not in name. Together, the Boer War and the Great War had revealed the delicate balance of political affairs in South Africa in particular because whites turned out to be splintered in themselves, just as tribally separated in their way as various black African

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ever overcome what Ritter ultimately characterizes as a fundamental inability to grasp certain cosmic truths. Equally important as a limited innate cosmic sensibility is Shaka's limited capacity for social improvement. Thus Ritter's conclusion that limited contacts outside the sphere of Natal would explain the absence of "an urge to progress. . . . Even had Shaka . . . carried out his plan . . . to learn Western techniques, the rising Nguni people would have been overwhelmed by the radiant energy of Western Civilization" (Ritter, 1995, p. 358). The effect of all of this is to perceive Shaka as a primitive hero-turned-psychotic ruler whose assassination was to be expected and even made necessary so that the Zulu people could reassess their position and perhaps aspire to the next stage of civilization. It perhaps ought to be remembered that, although Shaka died in 1828, the British colonialists did not defeat the Zulu empire decisively until 1879 (Golan, 1994, p. 5). But the attitude, which has the effect of privileging the colonial project in Africa, is not so much stated as implicated in the presentation. Ritter appears to have felt no need to justify or defend the colonial project; it was and remained the given situation for him
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Approximate Pages = 27 (250 words per page)

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