Decolonising Education in Postcolonial Zimbabwe: Context and the Way Forward

Abstract

The current reflection comes against the backdrop of coloniality; a cancer presently bedevilling education in Sub-Saharan Africa in general and Zimbabwe in particular. Coloniality is the colonial logic herein construed as the dark side of Euro-North American-centric modernity. Guided by the ‘postcolonial’ and ‘narratives of return’ theories, this secondary research explicates the context of coloniality within the Zimbabwean society in general and the country’s education system in particular. In the process, the paper reveals the impact of colonialism on, inter-alia, African history, power, epistemology, being, culture, religion, and heritage. It is against this background that the current reflection expounds the generic concept of decoloniality upon which it explores the possibilities of decolonising Zimbabwe’s education system. Decolonial ideals include but are not limited to the philosophy of African redemption, African renaissance, Unhu/Ubuntu, heritage-based philosophy, and Africanisation - most of which repose within Gade’s ‘narratives of return’ theory. It becomes permissible, therefore, to argue that customising Zimbabwe’s education curricula in accordance with Gade’s ‘narratives of return’ serves to effectively decolonise her education so that her paideia is in the end geared towards heritage-based creativity and innovation leading to indigenous-oriented but still globally competitive industrialisation. This penchant for decolonial ideals is, on the whole, exigent for reclaiming, restoring, repairing, rediscovering, and redefining the Afro-Zimbabwean history, power, knowledge, being, culture, religion, and heritage for posterity. It is, thus, recommended that decolonial ideals take centre stage in Zimbabwe’s postcolonial education system.