How did you come to choose your research topic?

I have spent my entire academic life exploring manifestations of cultural hybridity and métissage, the origins of racial theories, and the interactions between Africa and Europe (as far back as during antiquity and as recently as through the lens of development projects).

Another passion project of mine has always been exploring topics and populations I find to be relatively marginalised in academic discussions. I have always been drawn to histories with women from the African diaspora as the central characters. 

I was born in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. I am a product of the Indian Ocean world. After an undergraduate dissertation that focused on a novel depicting life in colonial Cameroon, I wrote a master’s dissertation that highlighted the different ways the unsolved tensions stemming from centuries of the European colonialism of Africa manifested themselves through the debates on African objects in European museums. Indeed, these tensions are not solely about the removal and need for the return of objects from one continent to the other, but rather truly concern the deep wounds caused by centuries of brutality and violence, and also the creation of intimacies and family bonds. I then decided to continue exploring these messy histories, but somewhere a little closer to home. I was fascinated by the idea of island histories, because islands encompass populations with origins from different parts of the world, but they can also be quite isolated and marginalised from the rest of the world, especially in scholarship. I wanted to conduct a more intimate study of how cultural transfers occur and new identities are formed, amidst pressure to conform as hybridity takes place within the realm of quite strict racial hierarchies.

Can you describe your thesis questions and your methodology?

My main thesis questions centre on the extent to which and the ways in which Zanzibari and Reunionese women played a major role in the creation of nationalist identities, through living in accordance with, as well as against, established gender norms during the colonial and nationalist periods. I expose how hybridity has manifested biologically and culturally (under the guise of the myth of purity) in both colonial Zanzibar and La Réunion and explore how processes of inclusion and exclusion are critical to identity (re)formation(s). I conducted oral history interviews as well as spent time at archives in both islands. I also used literature, music, and film to explore the central themes of this work. 
 

Archival Room at the National Museum of Tanzania.
Photograph by Aminata Buganzi Ruhinda Kinana
 

What are your major findings?

The ultimate goal of this dissertation was to explore the similarities and differences between the two islands in order to investigate how the colonial setting of each impacted trajectories in identity formation and nation-building. I found that there are many similarities in the way women in Zanzibar and La Réunion lived and formed their own identities, even as stereotypes of who they were and what they were about were disseminated throughout slavery and the colonial period. There were close links between the islands, ones that had been buried underneath language divisions and different histories of colonisation. I learned that the experiences of women of colour across the African diaspora are interconnected and need to be explored even further. Most importantly, I saw the links between racism, sexism, colonialism, slavery, and the battles women of colour face to the present day.

What could be the social and political implications of your thesis?

It is incredibly important to me that everything I write is informative, creative, and can be read with ease. I hope that women from these islands, Africa, and the diaspora as a whole will see themselves in this work, and that by being able to see the stories of their ancestors told in what I hope was a respectful and dignified way they will know that their own stories are worthy of being told. More importantly, I hope that they will also know that who they are and what they have to offer their countries and the world at large are meaningful and important not only to me, but to so many others. 
 

Three generations.
Photograph by Dada Maria (Aminata Buganzi’s childhood caregiver and beloved second mother)

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Aminata Buganzi Ruhinda Kinana defended her PhD thesis in International History and Politics on 8 October 2024. Associate Professor Aidan Russell presided over the committee, which included Professor Davide Rodogno, Thesis Supervisor, and, as External Reader, Marie-Aude Fouéré, Maîtresse de conférences, Institut des mondes africains, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Marseille, France.

Access to the PhD thesis: anyone interested in reading the PhD thesis, titled “Women, Métissage, and the Illusion of Race in Zanzibar and La Réunion: The Construction of Identities, Nations, and Global Culture”, will find it in the Graduate Institute’s repository by January 2025.

Banner image: Original entrance of the National Museum of Tanzania. Photograph by Aminata Buganzi Ruhinda Kinana.
Interview by Nathalie Tanner, Research Office.