Dr. Cairnie's primary field of research is Southern African literature (South African and Zimbabwean). She studies the land crisis and the crisis of childhood through Zimbabwean literature and other cultural texts.
She worked as a student-teacher at Mutorashanga Secondary School in Zimb...
Dr. Cairnie's primary field of research is Southern African literature (South African and Zimbabwean). She studies the land crisis and the crisis of childhood through Zimbabwean literature and other cultural texts.
She worked as a student-teacher at Mutorashanga Secondary School in Zimbabwe. Her dissertation was a study of poor whites and philanthropy in white South African and Zimbabwean writing.
In 2008, she co-edited a collection of essays, with Marion Walls (Essex University): "Revisiting Robert Tressell's Mugsborough: New Perspectives on The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists" (Cambria Press). The study re-situates the text in terms of its gender and imperial politics. She is developing a project on “Black and White Childhoods in Zimbabwe.”