Ropafadzo Chimusoro

Winnowing Herstory

In the song, Shandira Korona (Labor For the Crown), I ask God for strength to winnow because this journey is laborious, strenuous and isolating which also implies to the limitation of resources, influences and access for most practicing and aspiring black female artists to tell, question and produce their herstories. The melodic piece has moments of mourning and crying while singing to further express the nature in which winnowing as a black woman can be toilsome. This does not intend to undermine the importance of laboring but to acknowledge the emotional labor that takes place in the process of winnowing. While black women are praised for their strength, Winnowing Herstory seeks to praise and acknowledge the black woman in her moments of weariness and weakness. A part of the literal winnowing process involves tossing mealies, peanuts etc into the air from a winnowing basket to remove the chaff which is the excess particles from the produce. These are unneeded for production/consumption which translates into my practice as a basis for adopting cultural practices that have been established e.g African Literary frameworks which I translate, retell, question and conceptualize (thus being the form of removing excess particles.)