Mangena, T. orcid.org/0000-0002-2333-763X Precarity of the (Employed and Unemployed) Educated in Zimbabwe in Valerie Tagwira’s Trapped (2020). Scrutiny2: Issues in English studies in Southern Africa, 28 (1). pp. 20-32. ISSN 1812-5441
Abstract
Zimbabwean writer Valerie Tagwira’s novel Trapped (2020, Harare: Weaver Press) is set in Harare between the latter part of 2016 and November 2017, the period leading to the ousting of Robert Mugabe, the late former president of Zimbabwe, from power. The novel provides a glimpse into the lives of three protagonists, all of whom are university graduates, (un)employed, and forced to hustle for survival. Through these characters, Tagwira dramatises the condition of the educated and (un)employed in a dysfunctional economy and in the grips of a persistent crisis, which transforms them into “vagrants, vendors and criminals.” The overarching argument in this article is that the experiences of Tagwira’s characters are prisms through which to determine the effects—on the lives of the educated, both employed and unemployed—of Zimbabwe’s unprecedented and prolonged political and economic stagnation. Drawing on Guy Standing’s concept of the precariat and Michel de Certeau’s idea of the practice of everyday life, this article contends that Tagwira’s representation of the experiences of the educated, unemployed, and employed highlights the economic injustices that are rampant in postcolonial Zimbabwe.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
---|---|
Authors/Creators: |
|
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © Unisa Press 2024. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0). |
Keywords: | precarity; Zimbabwean crisis; educated; employed; unemployed; Valerie Tagwira |
Dates: |
|
Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 15 Feb 2024 13:32 |
Last Modified: | 09 Dec 2024 09:48 |
Status: | Published online |
Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/18125441.2024.2320891 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:209212 |
Download
Filename: Precarity of the Employed and Unemployed Educated in Zimbabwe in Valerie Tagwira s Trapped 2020 .pdf
Licence: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0