Kazmel Hamweemba

Kazmel is a doctoral candidate whose project uses historical evidence to illuminate contemporary urban politics in Zambia. His research traces the deep historical continuities that link present-day anxieties about economically marginalised young men, particularly concerns about morality and respectability, to late-colonial efforts to ‘civilise’ and impose moral order on urban African populations. By uncovering how the pathways to manhood now regarded as ‘traditional,’ ‘legal,’ or ‘normative’ were shaped through a history of control, discipline, struggle, and redefinition, his work shows how their ongoing reproduction contributes to today’s narrative of a ‘crisis of manhood’ among urban, economically marginalised young men. Ultimately, his study seeks to shed light on the representations, epistemologies, and knowledge hierarchies that inform both scholarly and popular understandings of marginalised urban male youths in Zambia. 

Kazmel completed an MSc in Africa and International Development at the University of Edinburgh, where he received the prize for overall best performance. Before beginning his postgraduate studies, he spent nearly three years working in the not-for-profit sector, leading the design and implementation of programmes that promoted sexual and reproductive health and rights, education, and livelihoods for children and young people in underserved communities in Livingstone, southern Zambia. 

His research is supported by ODID’s Abdul Raufu Mustapha Scholarship and a Merton College Scholarship.