This study examines the colonial and apartheid frameworks manifest in South Africa's land act legacies and the specific impact on land administration, gender, and the environment in the former apartheid homeland of Venda, South Africa. These historical forces shape present-day neocolonialism and globalization in the region which challenge the rights and citizenship of Black South African women within traditional leadership structures--concurrent with the country's democracy. In Venda, politicians, traditional leaders, and multinational corporations reinforce colonial and apartheid gender ideologies which undermine Vhomakhadzi roles and eco-cultural knowledge practices. Vhomakhadzi are women who have historically played a central role in their clans by advising Vhamusanda (chiefs) on community affairs and presiding over customs that connect with environmental sustainability. Yet today, leaders and politicians ignore Vhomakhadzi warnings that development projects threaten biodiversity and food and water security in the region-- instead commencing with deals to establish foreign coal mines, commercial farms, casinos, and tourist resorts. This empirical study in particular investigates the environmental and community activism and cultural biodiversity preservation strategies of Vhomakhadzi of the community-based organization Dzomo La Mupo. Through ethnographic-style interviews, participant observation, and archival research, this scholarship analyzes the historical and present-day gender politics that have diminished cultural biodiversity. The study reveals that colonial social formations historically confronted the role of makhadzi and continues to undermine her authority today in a globalized, post-apartheid era.
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