The plateau of trials: modern ethnicity in Angola

288 Pages·2016·1.51 MB·English

by  Vasco Martins

Escola de Sociologia e Políticas Públicas

The plateau of trials: modern ethnicity in Angola

Vasco Martins

Tese especialmente elaborada para obtenção do grau de

Doutor em Estudos Africanos

Orientador:
Fernando José Pereira Florêncio
Doutor em Estudos Africanos, Professor Auxiliar, Departamento de Ciências da Vida,
Universidade de Coimbra

Agosto, 2015

Escola de Sociologia e Políticas Públicas

The plateau of trials: modern ethnicity in Angola

Vasco Martins

Tese especialmente elaborada para obtenção do grau de

Doutor em Estudos Africanos

Júri:
Doutora Helena Maria Barroso Carvalho, Professora Auxiliar do ISCTE – Instituto Universitário
de Lisboa
Doutor José Carlos Gaspar Venâncio, Professor Catedrático do Departamento de Sociologia da
Universidade da Beira Interior
Doutor Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, Professor Auxiliar do St. Peters College da Universidade de
Oxford
Doutor Manuel António de Medeiros Ennes Ferreira, Professor Auxiliar do Instituto Superior de
Economia e Gestão
Doutor Eduardo Costa Dias Martins, Professor Auxiliar do ISCTE – Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa
Doutora Ana Lúcia Lopes de Sá, Professora Auxiliar Convidada do ISCTE – Instituto
Universitário de Lisboa
Doutor Fernando José Pereira Florêncio, Professor Auxiliar da Faculdade de Ciência e
Tecnologia da Universidade de Coimbra (Orientador)

Agosto, 2015

Acknowledgements

The profession of an academic is many times regarded as solitary work. There is some truth
to this statement, especially if like me, one spends most of the time reading, writing and
agonising over countless editions at home. However, there is an uncountable amount of people
involved in bringing a PhD thesis to life, people to whom I am most grateful.
During the duration of my PhD programme I have benefitted from a scholarship provided
by the FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia. This allowed me to be free of financial
preoccupations at a time when financial preoccupations affected everyone around me. Without
this scholarship it would have been impossible to even think about this project. Now that it is
finished, I am nothing but extremely grateful to the FCT.
To my supervisor Fernando Florêncio, my deepest gratitude. For the travels, the advice, the
lessons, all the revisions and the countless hours speaking and sharing stories about Angola. I
honestly could not have asked for a better advisor.
Preparing to travel and live in Angola is filled with such great financial and logistical
obstacles that one encounters them without even setting foot on an airplane. I remember vividly
the difficulties of applying to a visa to enter Angola, a fairly complex, expensive and bureaucratic
endeavour that alone took me one month to complete. Fortunately, after several contacts with
negative or no reply whatsoever I was able to get both an invitation and fieldwork assistance
during my stay by the good people at ADRA-Angola and its office in Huambo. My greatest
thanks to Dr. Belarmino Jelembi, Director Maria La Salette and Tio Bernardino, friend,
translator, storyteller and companion of many travels and witness to several successes and
failures.
During my stay in Angola I was lucky to have met Inge van Cauwenberg. Having lived in
Angola for nearly two decades, Inge provided me with many invaluable contacts, essentially
pulling my fieldwork from the rut of missed calls, failed encounters, strange faces and countless
political queries. Most importantly, Inge extended her trust to the people I was to interview, often
uncomfortable to talk about my research topic, fearful of my identity and unwilling to revisit the
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recent past. Through Inge I must also thank Development Workshop-Huambo, which allowed me
to use one of their offices to conduct interviews, organise notes and think about tomorrow.
My thanks also go to a friend of my family, whose name I refrain from revealing, for
arranging accommodation and picking me at the airport (a vital part of travelling to Angola).
Much of my time outside work was spent at his house with our bellies full and our feet in the
water. I met many good people during my stay in Huambo. Too many stories and funny episodes
prevent me from knowing what to write here. It won’t be long before we meet again.
Tokassikumossi!
On a more personal note, I must thank my true companion, Rita Guerreiro. She never
wavered after suffering through four years of my many ramblings, doubts and hours of
explaining and talking about Angola. I am happy that I could have shared some of Angola with
her. A word of gratitude to my parents, whose constant support and conviction of success
throughout the years enabled me to get to this point. To my friends, thank you for helping with
revisions. Having to endure lengthy explanations of Ovimbundu history was no small feat.
Finally, a much needed word about funding. Although funds are available they are still
deeply insufficient, especially considering the very expensive cost of living and travelling to and
inside Angola. An old Ovimbundu proverb says: “the turtle does not climb the tree on its own.
Someone must put it there.” As of this date, recent cuts to research funding and research centres
are creating deeper obstacles to the advancement of science in Portugal, forcing not only
researchers and scholars to look elsewhere for opportunity but also terminating some of the
opportunities my Angolan peers had in conducting their research in Portugal.
I was told by someone in Huambo that it is good that I’m doing research about the
Ovimbundu for they don’t know anything about themselves. Although a small contribution, this
work is about them and for them. My most honest wishes for peace in our time.

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Resumo

Esta dissertação trata a etnicidade moderna dos Ovimbundu do planalto central de Angola,
revelando o modo como as conceções de etnicidade dessa população foram alteradas por
processos de modernização, frequentemente introduzidos por elementos externos ao grupo, e
como esta modernização étnica veio a desempenhar um papel crítico, depois da independência do
país.
Este trabalho, seguindo um contraste na literatura existente entre a atribuição de uma importância
bastante significativa à etnicidade na agência humana ou a minimização do seu impacto face a
outros elementos explicativos, posiciona-se entre as duas abordagens, isto é, encontra um
argumento comum entre as duas vertentes literárias. É adotada uma abordagem construtivista,
patente em toda a tese e comumente utilizada em estudos académicos, que permite uma análise
da etnicidade moderna dos Ovimbundu, cruzando as várias influências a que a população do
planalto central esteve exposta com a sua própria agência e capacidade de imaginar e seguir
novas ideias associadas à modernização. Começa então a surgir um paradigma, fruto das
experiências apreendidas durante o colonialismo, influenciadas por processos de evangelização e
colonização, que permitem uma compreensão mais clara e completa de aspetos relacionados com
a organização dos movimentos políticos, a própria guerra civil e outros referentes a reconciliação
no pós-guerra, integração e formação do estado. Ganha forma a ideia de que, ao longo da
exposição dos argumentos, a construção e imaginação de identidades políticas dependem muito
dos vários processos de modernização étnica, que são ainda influentes na vida das pessoas na
Angola contemporânea.

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Abstract

This thesis is a study about the modern ethnicity of the Ovimbundu of the central highlands of
Angola. It shows how Ovimbundu conceptions of ethnicity became altered and enhanced by
processes of modernisation, usually introduced by foreign agents, and how this modernisation
came to play a critical role after independence.
Following a contrast in existing literature between either the attribution of vital importance to
ethnicity in human agency or the downplay of it in favour of other elements, this work may be
positioned in the middle, that is, it finds common ground with both arguments. I follow a
constructivist approach, patent throughout the thesis and much used by many academic studies,
which enables the analysis of Ovimbundu modern ethnicity by crossing the several influences the
people of the central highlands were exposed to with their own agency and capacity to imagine
and follow new ideas, mostly associated with modernisation. A paradigm begins emerging, one
that recurs to the experiences apprehended during colonialism, influenced by processes of
evangelisation and colonisation, which allow a clearer and more complete comprehension of
aspects pertaining to the organisation of the political movements, the civil-war and issues related
with post-war reconciliation, integration and state-formation. It becomes clear that the
construction and imagination of political identities was much dependent upon processes of ethnic
modernisation, which are still influential in people’s lives in contemporary Angola.

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Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS i
RESUMO iii
ABSTRACT iv
INTRODUCTION 1
Methodology 22
Organisation of chapters 27
CHAPTER 1. Religious missions in the central highlands 31
1.1 The influence of Protestantism 35
1.2 Catholic schooling and modernity 69
CHAPTER 2. Ethnic ramifications of colonial agency 83
2.1 Indirect rule 88
2.2 Moral ethnicity and early political tribalism 107
CHAPTER 3. The Ovimbundu and the liberation war 127
3.1 Early Ovimbundu anti-colonial nationalism 132
3.2 The Ovimbundu in the ethnicisation of the conflict 144
CHAPTER 4. Ovimbundu political ethnicity under UNITA 161
4.1 The ethnic mobilization of UNITA 165
4.2 UNITA and the modern imagination of Ovimbundu 191
CHAPTER 5. Integration and citizenship 221
5.1 On integration and reconciliation 223
5.2 On citizenship and nationalism 252
CONCLUSION 261
BIBLIOGRAPHY 269

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