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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:'To Make Them Serve': The 1871 Transvaal Commission on African Labour as a Source for Agrarian History
Author:Bergh, Johan S.ISNI
Year:2002
Periodical:History in Africa
Volume:29
Pages:39-61
Language:English
Geographic terms:South Africa
Transvaal
Subjects:agricultural history
historical sources
History and Exploration
Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
Labor and Employment
Ethnic and Race Relations
Politics and Government
Agriculture, Natural Resources and the Environment
colonialism
External link:https://www.jstor.org/stable/3172158
Abstract:In the past twenty to twenty-five years valuable contributions have been made to southern African agrarian history. However, there are still themes, regions and periods that need attention, one of these being the central districts of the Transvaal before the industrial revolution. In this regard a little-known source which may contribute to the knowledge of the pre-industrial history of the Transvaal, South Africa, and which will be published by J.S.Bergh and F. Morton as an annotated source publication, should be taken note of. This is the 1871 Commission on African Labour in the Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek (ZAR). The documents of the 1871 Commission contain a wealth of information on various aspects of agrarian history and need to be carefully researched and contextualized. Since they have only been used by a few historians, none of whom write agrarian history, they can make a significant contribution to the knowledge of pre-industrial agrarian history in areas of dense white settlement in the Transvaal. By using the documents of the 1871 Commission with other little-used sources, such as documents of the Hermannsburg and Berlin Mission societies, farm register books and published field work reports of anthropologists, an important new understanding of the processes and trends involved in pre-industrial agrarian history may be reached. Notes, ref.
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