Intermediaries, interpreters, and clerks : African employees in the making of colonial Africa /
edited by Benjamin N. Lawrance, Emily Lynn Osborn, and Richard L. Roberts.
- Madison, Wisconsin : University of Wisconsin Press, (c)2006.
- 1 online resource
- Africa and the diaspora .
Includes bibliographies and index.
Acknowledgments; Introduction: African Intermediaries and the "Bargain" of Collaboration -- Benjamin N. Lawrence, Emily Lynn Osborn, and Richard L. Roberts; The Formative Period of Colonial Rule, circa 1800-1920; An Interpreter Will Arise: Resurrecting Jan Tzatzoe's Diplomatic and Evangelical Contributions as a Cultural Intermediary on South Africa's Eastern Cape Frontier, 1816-1818 -- Roger S. Levine; Interpreting Colonial Power in French Guinea: The Boubou Penda-Ernest Noirot Affair of 1905 -- Emily Lynn Osborn. Interpretation and Interpolation: Shepstone as Native Interpreter -- Thomas McClendonPetitioners, "Bush Lawyers," and Letter Writers: Court Access in British-Occupied Lomé, 1914-1920 -- Benjamin N. Lawrence; Negotiating Legal Authority in French West Africa: The Colonial Administration and African Assessors, 1903-1918 -- Ruth Ginio; The Maturing Phase of Colonial Rule, ca. 1920-1960; "Collecting Customary Law": Educated Africans, Ethnographic Writings, and Colonial Justice in French West Africa -- Jean-Hervé Jézéquel. Interpreters Self-Interpreted: The Autobiographies of Two Colonial Clerks -- Ralph A. AustenAfrican Court Elders in Nyanza Province, Kenya, circa 1930-1960: From "Traditional" to "Modern" -- Brett L. Shadle ; Power and Influence of African Court Clerks and Translators in Colonial Kenya: The Case of Khwisero Native (African) Court, 1946-1956 -- Maurice Nyamanga Amutabi; The District Clerk and the "Man-Leopard Murders": Mediating Law and Authority in Colonial Nigeria -- David Pratten; Cultural Commuters: African Employees in Late Colonial Tanzania -- Andreas Eckert; Afterword. African Participation in Colonial Rule: The Role of Clerks, Interpreters, and Other Intermediaries -- Martin KleinAppendix: Personnel Files and the Role of Qadis and Interpreters in the Colonial Administration of Saint-Louis, Senegal, 1857-1911 -- Saliou Mbaye; Bibliography; Contributors; Index.
Africans in the lower echelons of colonial bureaucracy often held positions of little official authority, but in practice these positions were lynchpins of colonial rule. As the primary intermediaries among European colonial officials, African chiefs, and subject populations, these civil servants could manipulate the intersections of power, authority, and knowledge at the center of colonial society. By uncovering the role of such men (and a few women) in the construction, function, and legal apparatus of colonial states, the essays in this volume highlight a new perspective. They offer important insights on hegemony, collaboration, and resistance, structures and changes in colonial rule, the role of language and education, the production of knowledge and expertise in colonial settings, and the impact of colonization in dividing African societies by gender, race, status, and class.