The aristocratic agency: Resilience of Ngoni language in Inkosi Mpherembe’s area in Mzimba District, Malawi from 1870 to 1964

Abstract

The history of M’mbelwa Ngoni focuses on the changes or continuities at the national or paramountcy level. There has been little focus at local or sectional levels within the M’mbelwa Ngoni groups. This article, therefore, examines the resilience of the Ngoni language among the M’mbelwa Ngoni of Inkosi (chief) Mpherembe’s section in the northwestern part of Mzimba District, Malawi, from 1870 to 1964. It demonstrates that the Mpherembe Ngoni became more assertive than other Ngoni groups in Mzimba regarding their language identity when interacting with the indigenous Tumbuka inhabitants. It also establishes that the Mpherembe Ngoni had an uneasy relationship with the Livingstonia missionaries and British colonial administrators, who, to some extent, contributed to the promotion of the Tumbuka language at the expense of the Ngoni language in Mzimba District. This study used archival, oral and secondary sources.
Contribution: This study contributes to the growing historical understanding of the cultural complexities within the M’mbelwa Ngoni groups as they adapted to newly settled places after migrating from the modern-day KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa.