BOOK REVIEWS 117The next book is even less serious a study Š being largely a collectionof photographs culled from unacknowledged but apparently publishedsources, accompanied by a chronological outline based on newspaper orother secondary sources. The only claim to interest of the book is that areference to the embezzlement of defence funds led to a High Court injunc-tion against its distribution in Zimbabwe Rhodesia.Few politicians have held office for so long and so much the focus ofinternational attention; yet as these three books show, journalistic attentiondoes not produce even rudimentary understanding or insight. Survivors inpolitics always arouse suspicion Š except, perhaps, among other politicianswho, knowing their own precarious position, like Nyerere or Kaunda, can-not begrudge admiration. But admiration and suspicion do not really explainvery much: they tend to cancel out and leave a void of understanding, alimbo in which Smith, and even the Rhodesian Front, will languish in thetextbooks, unless a professional scholar can be given access. A party and aleader that can, apparently, do the opposite of what it intended and stillretain the confidence of its electorate needs to be sympathetically explained,not merely explained away.R.S.R.The Shona People : An Ethnography of the Contemporary Shona, withSpecial Reference to Their Religion By M. F. C. Bourdillon. GweloMambo Press, 1976, Shona Heritage Series: Volume 1, 339pp., maps,illus., bibl. ZR$6,80 (hard cover; $4,75 soft cover).Myths about Africans By M. F. C. Bourdillon. Gwelo, Mambo Press, 1976,35pp., ZR$0,45.Bourdillon's The Shona Peoples is the first significant and systematic attemptto present a comprehensive ethnography of the Shona peoples since Bullock's1928 work (The Mashona. Cape Town, Juta, reprinted and revised as TheMashona and Matabele, Cape Town, Juta, 1950). During the interim periodserious scholars have had to rely for this kind of over-view on the slimvolume published by the International African Institute (H. Kuper, A. B. J.Hughes and J. van Velsen, The Shona and Ndebele of Southern Rhodesia,London, International African Institute, 1955) or else make their own syn-thesis through the diffuse literature produced by Holleman, Gelfand andothers. Bourdillon's book is a far better one than the Bullock and I. A. I.volumes, and although written primarily for a lay audience its underlyinganthropological professionalism renders it without question the currentstandard ethnography of the Shona. It is therefore an extremely usefuladdition to our bookshelves, serving a dual purpose. For students andscholars it provides a reliable ethnographic reference base for more specificstudies, and for a White lay readership in this country it provides a 'greatertmderstanding of their black compatriots', the stated primary aim of thebook (p.9).Bourdillon utilizes a straightforward ethnographic presentation, cover-ing in various chapters history, kinship, economic institutions, local-levelpolitical organization, legal structures and religious organization and practice.118 BOOK REVIEWSAs indicated by the sub-title, considerable attention is given to religion, withseparate chapters being devoted to sickness and misfortune, witchcraft,death and the communal aspects of religion in both traditional and con-temporary contexts.This emphasis is not misplaced, for it serves to bring out the epistemo-logical underpinnings of Shona culture, a necessary complement to Bour-dillon's treatment of the structural aspects of Shona society. It is this aspectof the book which, more than any other, carries it beyond mere descriptionto an analysis of cultural motivation for action in the best anthropologicaltradition. Dr Bourdillon succeeds admirably in the difficult task of writinga scholarly and accurate book which is readable; it is analytic without beingobscure, detailed without being verbose, and generalizes with appropriateconsideration for regional particularities. Well documented and referenced,it provides both a useful synopsis of the available literature and a valuablecontext in which it can be read.As a comprehensive contemporary ethnography of the Shona I canfault the volume in only three respects, one of which the author himselfraises with disarming candour and for one of which he can hardly be heldresponsible. A comprehensive Shona ethnography should include more thanthis one does on the Shona-speaking peoples of Mogambique, in particularthe Barwe, the Teve (a sub-division of the Manyika) and the Ndau. But,as I say, Bourdillon can hardly be blamed for this as the extant anthropo-logical literature on these groups in either Portuguese or English is limited,and the exigencies of international politics have made any co-ordinatedscholarship difficult if not impossible. A more serious defect of the bookis the paucity of material presented on contemporary urban Shona life. Thebrief chapter, 'Becoming Urban' (pp. 361-74), hardly does justice to thisimportant topic. Bourdillon is at a disadvantage here, since although con-siderable sociological attention has been given in recent years to this categoryof the Shona population, in-depth anthropological studies are scarce and donot match the wealth of detail and analysis to be found in, for instance,neighbouring Zambia. Nevertheless the chapter gives the impression of beinga postscript hastily written to meet a publisher's deadline, rather than beinggiven the central importance it deserves.Finally, Bourdillon explicitly attempts to avoid any specific analysisof the national political dimension of his topic on the grounds of complexityand possible subjective influence on both the book and its readership (pp.10-11). While understanding his reasons, my reaction to this approach bythe author was one of considerable disappointment. For one thing, the impactof politicization in a national context is a critical component of contemporarycultural formation for the Shona and therefore pervasively important forthe topic of the book. For another thing, Dr Bourdillon is well equipped tohandle this topic; he has ample materials in his files and the scholarly integ-rity and skill to write incisively on the subject. Readers of this book should,in fact, read it in conjunction with his booklet, Myths About Africans.Here Dr Bourdillon shows a keen awareness of the impact of the im-portance of political context and also of how the conceptualization of aculture by both in-groups and out-groups can be turned and shaped as aninstrument of political policy. It is a pity that the insights of this bookletwere not utilized by Dr Bourdillon to produce a further chapter for thebook, exploring the influence of the environing political climate on thecontemporary development of Shona culture.BOOK REVIEWS 319But I have no wish to join the long list of reviewers who are criticalon the grounds that the book the author wrote was not the one they wantedwritten, and perhaps Dr Bourdillon was right in restricting his goal to avolume which seeks to promote White understanding of Shona culture ina non-polemic way. Aware of past White intransigence Peter Fry, in anotherreview of this book (Africa (1978), XLVIII, 92-3) is sceptical of thisapproach: 'Dr Bourdillon's desire to enlighten the white population throughthe writing of an honest and straightforward ethnography is, I fear, undulyoptimistic, and his deliberate avoidance of political issues unnecessarilycautious.' This is, however, a statement written from the static perspectiveof one whose first-hand experience of the power structure of this countryis now somewhat dated. Whites here are now faced with the requirementof adjusting to a new status of political subordinancy and the necessity of'a greater understanding of their black compatriots' carries a new urgencyand importance. For them, this book is a valuable tool and should be read byall. And, for the benefit of Blacks themselves, this book should be on theshelves of every secondary and tertiary institution of learning in the land,as the standard contemporary ethnography of the Shona.University of Rhodesia M. W. MURPHREI;Historical Dictionary of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe By /?. K. Rasmussen Metuchen,N. Y., Scarecrow Press, 1979, 445pp., US$20,00.From Avondale to Zimbabwe By R. Smith. Salisbury, privately, [1978],314pp.3 ZR$6,00 (s/c).These two reference books will be useful to anyone pursuing research inRhodesia.Rasmussen's volume is the more ambitious and follows the establishedformat of the African Historical Dictionaries Series in which this is theeighteenth to be published. It contains some 1,199 entries and the author hasmade valiant efforts to keep abreast of recent historical research. Inevitablythere are numerious points that will not meet general agreement and everyreader will find what he regards as serious omissions; for example, Keigwinand N. H. Wilson are not included, although Wilson's Two Pyramid policyis entered but ascribed to Huggins. Similarly the criteria of selection some-times seem strange Š entries for rhinoceros and elephant, but none for theCold Storage Commission, the Maize Control Board or the AgriculturalMarketing Authority. Generally the book is weak on institutions, somewhaterratic on places (cf Goromanzi [sic]), stronger on the Ndebele than theShona.Smith's volume is a modest gazetteer of some 130 places in ZimbabweRhodesia, and on his chosen places is generally stronger than Rasmussen;see for example, Rasmussen's failure to explain the origin of the Tuli Circlecompared with Smith's neat and historically accurate description.Whatever their failings, these two books, in conjunction with the bib-liographies reviewed above (p.lO5ff), mark a significant and welcomeaddition to the reference aids on Zimbabwe Rhodesia.R.S.R.