Lovers in time : practice research in the times of patriotic journalism in Zimbabwe

Abstract

This article features my practice research in Zimbabwe. In particular, I focus on the issues surrounding the staging of the most controversial theatrical play during the Harare International Festival of the Arts in 2014, Lovers in Time, written by Zimbabwean Blessing Hungwe and produced and directed by myself. I present the case against the background of the media furore that surrounded the production. I see the press reactions, which changed from very positive to irrationally vitriolic, as an example of patriotic journalism and Althusserian interpellation. Under the particular circumstances in Zimbabwe, my whiteness, gender and European background were also an issue discussed both in the media and among the members of our theatrical company when decisions had to be made regarding where the lines of belonging lie and why. The article suggests that open discussions of this nature might be helpful in terms of de-mystifying the cultural challenges and subverting patriarchal notions of production of knowledge in which the myth of objectivity is still advanced as the only valid scholarly interrogation.