African workers and colonial racism : Mozambican strategies and struggles in Lourenço Marques, 1877 - 1962

This path-breaking history of the African working class in Lourenco Marques proceeds from the assumption that Mozambican labor history was not fundamentally about skills, wages, or productivity - it was about racism, human dignity, and contested masculinity. While white officials proclaimed their in...

Ausführliche Beschreibung

Gespeichert in:
Bibliographische Detailangaben
VerfasserIn: Penvenne, Jeanne
Ort / Verlag / Datum:Portsmouth, NH : Heinemann [u.a.], 1995
Erscheinungsjahr:1995
Sprache:Englisch
Serie:Social history of Africa
Schlagworte:
Klassifikation:960 Geschichte Afrika
Online-Zugang:04
Beschreibung:XVII, 229 S.; Ill., Kt.
Tags: Tag hinzufügen
Keine Tags, Fügen Sie den ersten Tag hinzu!
Beschreibung
Zusammenfassung:This path-breaking history of the African working class in Lourenco Marques proceeds from the assumption that Mozambican labor history was not fundamentally about skills, wages, or productivity - it was about racism, human dignity, and contested masculinity. While white officials proclaimed their intent to protect the innocent "natives" and assimilate the African elite into Portuguese society as full citizens, African workers in Mozambique believed the Portuguese were there to "drink our blood" and "steal our wages." Concerted attempts by Africans to improve their lives through hard work were frustrated time and again by white employers determined to keep them in their place. The author argues persuasively that the imperatives of race and racism outweighed considerations of class in shaping the relations between colonizer and colonized. Brutal forced-labor policies made it difficult for rural Africans to survive despite their continued access to agricultural land and family labor. Thus the majority of African men living in southern Mozambique spent their adult lives in wage labor, whether they worked in the South African mines or took low-paying jobs in and around the port city of Lourenco Marques. This lively and balanced analysis brings the voices of African workers to the foreground and contrasts their historical vision with that found in letters, newspapers, and confidential Portuguese documents. By detailing the individual experiences of gang laborers, stevedores, domestic servants, and petty clerks, the author focuses our attention on the human dimensions of colonial racism.
ISBN:0435089528
0435089544
0852556640
0852556144
186814268X
AC Nummer:AC13740963
Hierarchiestufe:Monografie
Erscheinungsform:Buch
Inhalt:Text
Medientyp:Analog
Datenträger:Analog