agonya neiko mfanha uyu? Of death and funerals - a semiotic exploration of the Shona funeral ritual in Zimbabwe

Death and funerals offer a context that draws very interesting semiotic signals that define death, the dead and management of death itself. This paper explores some Shona expressions rich in semiotic signals that generate meanings that define funerals and death in contemporary Zimbabwe. Using semiot...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inAfrican identities Vol. 15; no. 4; pp. 353 - 366
Main Author Saidi, Umali
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Pretoria Routledge 02.10.2017
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Subjects
agonya
Beliefs
body/bhodhi
Cultural heritage
Death & dying
Death rituals
funeral
Funerals
Human body
identity
Meaning
mutumbi
Power
rite
Rites & ceremonies
Semiotic
Semiotics
Social identity
Zimbabwe
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Summary:Death and funerals offer a context that draws very interesting semiotic signals that define death, the dead and management of death itself. This paper explores some Shona expressions rich in semiotic signals that generate meanings that define funerals and death in contemporary Zimbabwe. Using semiotics, the article argues that there is a reconfiguration of identities in societies as they participate and respond to the funeral ritual in Africa. The article further argues that there exists an attempt to demarcate the dead from the living without necessarily questioning cultural belief systems as well as connections to the world of the dead who are culturally assumed to have assumed power of the spiritual.
ISSN:1472-5843
1472-5851
DOI:10.1080/14725843.2017.1319758