The Zimbabwean writers Catherine Buckle and Nyaradzo Mtizira reimagine kongonya dance in their works Beyond Tears: Zimbabwe's Tragedy (2002) and The Chimurenga Protocol (2008), respectively. Both the European-born Buckle and the black Zimbabwean Mtizira harness the dance to evoke the post-2000 jambanja experiences associated with Zimbabwe's controversial “Third Chimurenga,” or the fast-track land reform program, beginning in 2000. Their contrasting depictions of dance epitomize the differing views on Zimbabwe's land reform program. Largely, whereas Buckle's novel is a memoir which personalizes a farmer's encounters with dancing African/Zimbabwean “land invaders,” Mtizira's is a panegyric that collectively reimagines a nation's defiant revolution against purported forces of Western imperialism. Both writers’ representations of the post-2000 Zimbabwe's dance performances are therefore colored and compromised by racial subjectivity.

The article analyzes kongonya dance as it occurs in everyday Zimbabwean spaces. Tracing its origins, utility, and metamorphosis, I studied kongonya dance in its performed world; observed kongonya being danced at a pungwe, a gala, and a political function; and watched kongonya being performed on state television. Through participant-observations, respondent testimonies, and personal interviews of dancers and nondancers for all these contexts, pertinent data on kongonya were collected. The article contends that kongonya has both a human and inhuman face, having been transformed from a dance for the people into a dance against the people—a phenomenon at the mercy of political manipulators. Despite kongonya having creatively promoted the nationalist cause of the 1970s Zimbabwean liberation party, kongonya has been abused in the postcolonial state in an attempt to placate citizens, suppress dissension, and (also) in the hopes of reinvigorating the waning fortunes of the ruling party, ZANU PF. Initially, kongonya reflected an apparently more national outlook than an ethnic one, but lately it has revealed rather hegemonic traits. Regrettably, politicians sought to manipulate the malleability of dance and harness kongonya's national character to an exclusionist political agenda.