15:30 - 17:00
Room: Arts – Lecture Room 5
Stream: Open Stream
“All the rights which Chiefs have” – the testimony of traditional authorities before the South African Native Affairs Commission, 1903-1905
Claudia Berger
University of Duisburg-Essen, Duisburg

Commissions are infamous for being an administrative instrument in 19th and 20th century South Africa to legitimate the introduction or widen the scope of segregation measures and regimes. The South African Native Affairs Commission (SANAC), which collected evidence in British colonies and protectorates (Cape Colony, Natal, Orange River Colony, Transvaal, Southern Rhodesia, Swaziland, Basutoland as well as Bechuanaland) from 1903-1905, is no exception.

The well-edited minutes of evidence the commission presented 1905 alongside with their report were used as a tool to suggest segregation matters, arguing that this had been approved by the witnesses or would at least improve their living conditions. As problematical, as these minutes are as a source for a historiographical analysis, they are worth a closer look: Blurred by editing and translation, they still allow us to get an impression of how traditional authorities tried to argue their case (if they tried to), which worries they expressed in front of the commission and which other communicative tactics they deployed.


Reference:
Th-OS21 Revisiting-P-004
Presenter/s:
Claudia Berger
Presentation type:
Panel
Room:
Arts – Lecture Room 5
Date:
Thursday, 13 September
Time:
16:15 - 16:30
Session times:
15:30 - 17:00