{"schema_version":"bf_book_companion_v1","release_id":"20260417T232332Z","book":{"amazon_purchase_url":"https://www.amazon.com/dp/0813954495?tag=bookfrontier-20","asin":"0813954495","authors":["Trishula Rachna Patel"],"book_id":"9780813954493","canonical_url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/becoming-zimbabwean-0813954495","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780813954493.jpg?v=20260417T232332Z%3A2026-04-17T23%3A23%3A32Z","description":"The first comprehensive history of Indian migrants and their descendants in Zimbabwe Becoming Zimbabwean tells the long-overdue story of the Indian community in the former British colony of Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe. Centering the stories of individuals and families, and building on a foundation of extensive archival research, Trishula Rachna Patel—a Zimbabwean of Indian origin herself—shows that the history of Indians in Zimbabwe is not of a transient diaspora but one of deliberate permanence. Indians initially played a critical part in the settler colonial process in Southern Rhodesia, but as new generations were born and raised, their politics and social lives evolved to localized forms of citizenship. Eventually, they functioned as part of the resistance to the Rhodesian white minority government, either through participation in the system as nonwhites or by joining the Black anticolonial nationalist movement. They did all this through their shops, African-rooted institutions that became social, economic, and political spaces through which Indians became Zimbabwean. In this highly readable and authoritative study, Patel makes clear that Zimbabwe cannot be properly understood without accounting for the substantial Indian community that has woven itself into the fabric of the nation.","forthcoming":false,"isbn13":"9780813954493","publication_date":"20260105","publisher":"University of Virginia Press","slug":"becoming-zimbabwean","subtitle":"A History of Indians in Rhodesia","title":"Becoming Zimbabwean"},"discovery":{"categories":{"all":[{"bisac_code":"SOC008020","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Asian Culture & Society","score":0.7404,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"HIS001040","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Southern African History","score":0.725,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"SOC008010","confidence_band":"medium","label":"African Studies","score":0.7176,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"hint":[{"bisac_code":"SOC008020","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Asian Culture & Society","score":0.7404,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"HIS001040","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Southern African History","score":0.725,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"SOC008010","confidence_band":"medium","label":"African Studies","score":0.7176,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"publisher":[{"bisac_code":"HIS001040","confidence_band":"high","label":"Southern African History","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"HIS062000","confidence_band":"high","label":"History of India","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"SOC002010","confidence_band":"high","label":"How Cultures Work","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"SOC008010","confidence_band":"high","label":"African Studies","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"SOC008020","confidence_band":"high","label":"Asian Culture & Society","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"}]},"genres":[{"label":"Asian Culture & Society","score":0.7404,"slug":"asian-culture-society"},{"label":"Southern African History","score":0.725,"slug":"southern-african-history"},{"label":"African Studies","score":0.7176,"slug":"african-studies"}],"reader_fit":["Good for readers who enjoy Asian Culture & Society","Good for readers interested in history","Good for readers who enjoy Asian Culture & Society and Southern African History."],"related_lists":[],"series":null,"similar_books":[{"authors":["Monique A. 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