Ngonyama was born in 1926, the daughter of a Christian minister.[2] She attended Goromonzi High School and took her O-Level in 1950, scoring the highest in the country among both black and white students. In her eulogy, Arthur Mutambara said "Without firing a single shot, going to detention or organising political resistance, as a high school student in 1950, Susan scored a major victory for the freedom and liberation of Zimbabwe."[3]
She attended Fort Hare University in South Africa and graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1953.[2][3] In the early 1960s, she and her husband earned master's degrees from University College, London.[4] They returned to Zimbabwe where she was a teacher and her husband was the headmaster of Hartzell High School.[3]
In 1983, she was the first female Public Service Commissioner in Zimbabwe. [2][3]
Susan Dangarembga died in 2017 in Zimbabwe at the age of 91.[2]
