Historicizing Secular-Religious Demarcations

Part II Colonial Boundaries: Religion, Culture, and “Middle Things”

King, Messiah, and Culture in the Making of Zulu Secularity

Magnus Echtler

Abstract

Using the multiple secularities approach, this paper analyzes the practical formation and reconfiguration of Zulu secularity as a process of culturalization. After initial colonial encounters established a new religious field centered on Christian mission stations, the secularization of African traditions as non-religious custom, and hence as culture, decisively shaped Zulu secularity. Codified in native law, custom formed the central component of indirect rule in British colonialism. Subsequently, Africans mobilized customs in the construction of Zulu cultural identity, which cut ...