Burial of oscillating rural-urban and oscillating rural-diasporic indigenous Zimbabweans at dilapidated rural homes (matongo): a case study of the genesis of tent huts and kinship funeral expense fund groups in Buhera District, Zimbabwe

ABSTRACT

I argue that an increase in the number of oscillating rural-urban (ORU) and oscillating rural-diasporic (ORD) indigenous Zimbabweans’ interments at dilapidated homes has resulted in the genesis and upsurge in temporary tent huts in which African Indigenous Religion (AIR) burial and funeral rituals are performed. Research findings conclude that there is an increasing number of ORU and ORD indigenous Zimbabweans who respectively after their deaths in urban centres and in the diaspora have AIR burial rites performed in tent huts at their deceased parents’ ruined homes in the rural areas. Research findings also reveal that traditional burial societies died in Zimbabwe due to economic hardships and that necessitated the formation of Kinship Funeral Expenses Fund Groups (KFEFG) in urban centres by the ORU Zimbabweans and Funeral Insurance Policies (FIP) by Zimbabwean diasporians which replaced burial societies. The conclusion is that despite an increasing number of Zimbabweans living, educated and owning houses in urban centres in Zimbabwe and in foreign countries, they still regard their decrepit rural abodes as their spiritual home and a place for their burials when they die.

KEYWORDS:

• Hut
• tent
• rural
• burial
• entombed

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on the contributor

Dr Collis Garikai Machoko is an Anglican Priest, born in Zimbabwe and educated in Zimbabwe where he obtained BSc (Honours) Agriculture; BA (Honours) Religious Studies, MA Religious Studies, DPhil Religious Studies, and a Diploma in Christian Systematic Theology. He was ordained an Anglican priest in the Anglican Diocese of Harare in 1990 and served as an Anglican priest in the parishes of Makonde (Chinhoyi), Chegutu and Kadoma from 1990 to 2000. He has taught at the University of Zimbabwe, the Christian College of Southern Africa (CCOSA), Domboshawa and Harare Theological Colleges in Zimbabwe, Huntington University in Ontario, Canada, Trinity College at the University of Toronto, at the University of Manitoba and the University of Winnipeg, as well as Providence University College and the Theological Seminary in Otterburne, Manitoba.