Rethinking the Political Order in the KwaZulu-Natal Region in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries: Fluidity, Mobility, and Flexibility

The history of the KwaZulu-Natal region in the period under study has mostly been written round the evolution of a series of polities seen as more or less firmly bounded territorial “states.” This approach goes hand in hand with readings of recorded oral source materials as “oral traditions.” In this article, we reread the materials not simply as relayed historical accounts but as evidence of past discursive practices geared towards the navigation of change. This allows us to argue that a fundamental feature of the political order at this time was a degree of mobility and political flexibility that earlier studies hardly engage with.