Guerrilla Girl: A Girl's echoing voice in the Zimbabwe Chimurenga

Book excerpt: Southern Rhodesia was a colony of the British Empire. In 1980, it gained independence as modern-day Zimbabwe, after a long liberation struggle, and a bitter guerrilla war. Guerrilla Girl tells the story of Shupai, and her journey to liberation. Follow her from impoverished childhood in a convent school in rural Rhodesia; to her experiences of discrimination and injustice as a young woman in the capital Salisbury; her radical awakening amongst youth political groups; to her transformation into a highly trained freedom fighter. The women of Zimbabwe had to fight for liberation on two fronts: from the domination of the common colonialist enemy, and from the male chauvinism of their countrymen. Most African men in Zimbabwe found it hard to accept women as fighters, let alone as armed guerrillas. Women had a hard time asserting themselves as capable and trusted liberators, always in danger of being put down by their male counterparts. Whilst the names of the characters are fictitious, the majority of events and places are true.