'The natives are getting out of hand': Legislating manners, insolence and contemptuous behaviour in Southern Rhodesia, c. 1910-1963

Journal of Southern African Studies

Volumn 33, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 653-672

  Shutt, Allison K ^a  

^a HENDRIX COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

COLONIALISM; HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY; INDIGENOUS POPULATION; POLITICAL REPRESSION; POPULAR PROTEST;

AFRICA; SOUTHERN AFRICA; SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA; ZIMBABWE;

EID: 34548184699     PISSN: 03057070     EISSN: 14653893     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/03057070701475765     Document Type: Article

References (173)

1. A. Stoler, Carnal Knowledge and Imperial Power: Race and the Intimate in Colonial Rule (Los Angeles, University of California Press, 2002).
2. See N. Elias, TheCivilising Process, E.Dunning, J.Goudsblomand S.Mennell (eds), translated byEdmund Jephcott with notes by Elias, revised edition (Oxford, Blackwell Publishers, 2000).
3. For a recent critique of Elias's model see B.H. Rosenwein, 'Worrying about Emotions in History', American Historical Review, 107, 3 (June 2002), pp. 821-45.
4. And see E. Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (New York, Doubleday, 1959).
5. R.Ross, Status andRespectability in theCapeColony, 1750-1870 (Cambridge,CambridgeUniversity Press, 1999)
6. and R.Ross, Beyond the Pale:ESsays on theHistory of Colonial South Africa (Hanover,WesleyanUniversity Press, 1993), Chapter 4 on the significance of handshaking. On the 'everyday' of race
7. see T. Holt, 'Marking: Race, Race- Making, and theWriting of History', American Historical Review, 100, 1 (February 1995), pp. 1-20.
8. Language manuals and settler novels served the same socialising purpose in Southern Rhodesia. See D. Jeater, 'The Way You Tell Them: Language, Ideology and Development Policy in Southern Rhodesia', African Studies, 54 (1995), pp. 1-15
9. and A. Chennells, 'Settler Myths and the Southern Rhodesian Novel' (DPhil thesis, University of Zimbabwe, 1982).
10. W. Harris, 'Etiquette, Lynching, and Racial Boundaries in Southern History: A Mississippi Example', American Historical Review, 100, 2 (April 1995), pp. 387-410
11. J. Daily, 'Deference and Violence in the Postbellum Urban South: Manners and Massacres in Danville, Virginia', The Journal of Southern History 63, 3 (August 1997), pp. 553-90.
12. Etiquette has been a more central and longstanding concern for students of the American South. See B.W. Doyle, 'The Etiquette of Race Relations: Past, Present, and Future', Journal of Negro Education, 5, 2 (April 1936), pp. 191-208
13. Daily, 'Deference and Violence'; Harris, 'Etiquette, Lynching, and Racial Boundaries'; J. Ritterhouse, Growing Up Jim Crow: How Black and White Southern Children Learned Race (Chapel Hill, NC, University of North Carolina Press, 2006)
14. B. Wyatt-Brown, Southern Honor: Ethics and Behavior in the Old South (New York, Oxford University Press, 1982).
15. Ross, Status and Respectability.
16. A.K. Shutt, 'The Settlers' "Cattle Complex": The Etiquette of Culling Cattle in Colonial Zimbabwe, 1938', Journal of African History, 43, 2 (2002), pp. 263-86. Studies of colonial women have likewise stressed the importance of manners in marking and maintaining difference as well as racial cohesion.
17. See M. Strobel, European Women and the Second British Empire (Bloomington, IN, Indiana University Press, 1991).
18. C. Summers, 'Radical Rudeness: Ugandan Social Critiques in the 1940s', Journal of Social History, 39, 3 (Spring 2006), pp. 741-70.
19. T. Burke, Lifebuoy Men, Lux Women (Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 1996), pp. 99-104, 150.
20. M.O. West, The Rise of an African Middle Class: Colonial Zimbabwe, 1898-1965 (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2002).
21. Also see T. Ranger, Are We Not Also Men? (Portsmouth, NH, Heinemann, 1995)
22. and C. Summers, Colonial Lessons (Portsmouth, NH, Heinemann, 2002).
23. T. Barnes, 'We Women Worked So Hard': Gender, Urbanisation and Social Reproduction in Colonial Harare, Zimbabwe, 1930-1956 (Portsmouth, NH, Heinemann, 1999), p. 93, Chapter 4, passim.
24. A good contrast with Barnes's work is D.Goodhew, 'Working-class Respectability: The Example of theWestern Areas of Johannesburg, 1930-55', Journal of African History, 41, 2 (2000), pp. 241-66.
25. On colonial domesticity see K. Tranberg Hansen (ed.), African Encounters with Domesticity (New Brunswick, NJ, Rutgers University Press, 1992),
26. and A. Kaler, 'Visions of Domesticity in the African Women's Homecraft Movement in Rhodesia', Social Science History, 23, 3 (Fall 1999), pp. 269-309.
27. F. Cooper and A. Stoler (eds), Tensions of Empire (Berkeley, CA, University of California Press, 1997)
28. and Stoler, Carnal Knowledge.
29. See J. Iliffe, Honour in African History (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005).
30. See E. Saada, 'The Empire of Law: Dignity, Prestige, and Domination in the "Colonial Situation"', French Politics, Culture and Society, 20, 2 (Summer 2002), in Literature Resource Center [online database], Galenet Group. Accessed 22 June 2006. Available: Bailey Library, Hendrix College.
31. This article is based on NC's court cases from all districts in Southern Rhodesia. However the records are uneven and it is clear that many cases of insolence are not in the extant records.
32. Rhodesian Opinion, 19 November 1909, 'A Regrettable Incident', 'Colonial', p. 5.
33. On Southern Rhodesia's history, see the works cited above, as well as T. Ranger, Revolt in Southern Rhodesia (Evanston, IL, Northwestern University Press, 1967)
34. L. Vambe, An III-Fated People (Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh Press, 1972)
35. A. Mlambo, White Immigration into Rhodesia, From Occupation to Federation (Harare, University of Zimbabwe Press, 2002)
36. D. Kennedy, Islands of White: Settler Society and Culture in Kenya and Southern Rhodesia, 1890-1939 (Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 1987).
37. The High Commissioner's Proclamation, 1898 established the Native Department and detailed the roles of Native Commissioners and Africans in the colony. C. Palley, The Constitutional History and Law of Southern Rhodesia 1888-1965 with Special Reference to Imperial Control (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1966), pp. 138-40.
38. Rhodesian Opinion, 11 December 1908, 'Slashes and Puffs', p. 4. In her review of some 50 years of settlers' newspapers, Vassilatos found that Africans were rarely mentioned except as poor cyclists, alcoholics, vagabonds, pass-law offenders, and criminals. E. Vassilatos, 'Race and Class: The Development and Influence of White Images of Blacks in Southern Rhodesia, 1890-1939' (PhD thesis, University of Rhodesia, 1977).
39. For a recent argument that racism is not confined to sight or perceived colour difference, see M. Smith, How Race is Made: Slavery, Segregation, and the Senses (Chapel Hill, NC, University of North Carolina, 2006).
40. On the racial education of youth see Ritterhouse, Growing Up Jim Crow; Stoler, Carnal Knowledge, Chapter 5
41. U. Mehta, 'Liberal Strategies of Exclusion', in Cooper and Stoler (eds), Tensions of Empire, pp. 67-70.
42. On theatrical use of racialised space see R.D.G. Kelley, '"We Are Not What We Seem": Rethinking Black Working Class Opposition in the Jim Crow South', The Journal of American History (June 1993), pp. 103-10.
43. On black peril in Rhodesia see J. McCulloch, Black Peril, White Virtue, Sexual Crime in Southern Rhodesia, 1902-1935 (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2000)
44. and J. Pape, 'Black and White: The Perils of Sex in Colonial Zimbabwe', Journal of Southern African Studies, 16, 4 (December 1990), pp. 699-720.
45. The CNC, Matabeleland stated that the 'dignity' of the chiefs 'was clearly wanting on this occasion'. Report of the CNC, Matabeleland, 1909, p. 1. On Lord Selbourne's visit see C. Summers, From Civilisation to Segregation (Athens, OH, Ohio University Press, 1994), pp. 129-30.
46. Rhodesian Opinion, 19 November 1909, 'A Regrettable Incident', 'Colonial', p. 5.
47. Daily, 'Deference and Violence', p. 559; also see pp. 555, 557-9.
48. Palley, Constitutional History, p. 183.
49. Ibid., p. 183-4.
50. More specifically, the courts system mirrored the Cape's Dutch legal system. On similar struggles between the law department and NCs in South Africa see I. Evans, Bureaucracy and Race: Native Administration in South Africa (Los Angeles, University of California Press, 1997), pp. 168-70.
51. The 1898 High Commissioner's Proclamation granted NCs some judicial authority, and even allowed nine of the then 24 NCs the power to hear minor legal cases involving settlers. Palley, Constitutional History pp. 139, 513, footnote 5.
52. Southern Rhodesia Native Regulations Proclamation, 1910, Part II, section 14 (a) and (b).
53. Native Regulations, Part VIII, section 49. These fines suggest the gravity with which NCs viewed insolence. See Judge Tredgold's critique of NCs for their excessive fines, N3/15/1: Salisbury Herald, 28 October 1921, 'Judge and Jury', and the CNC's response which argued that such criticism brought NCs into public 'contempt and ridicule': CNC to Secretary, Department of the Administrator, 8 November 1921; Attorney-General, Remarks by the Senior Judge which appeared in the Salisbury Herald of 28 October 1921, 1 December 1921.
54. In addition, magistrates working in towns heard all cases, including those involving Africans, although they could seek the advice of NCs in such cases. See N3/28/11: H. Marshall Hole, Secretary, Department of the Administrator to CNC, Bulawayo, 29 April 1911. The CNC at first refused to send the Administrator's memo to his officers since it rescinded an earlier ruling that suggested that NCs could hear criminal and civil cases between Africans. See in the same file, A.H. Holland, Acting Secretary, Department of Administration, Circulation Letter, 5 December 1910; Acting CNC, Jackson to Secretary, Department of Administration, 4 May 1911; H. Marshall Hole, Secretary, Department of Administration to CNC, Bulawayo, 29 April 1911.
55. R. Carson Smith, 'The Struggle to Control Dispute Proceedings in Southern Rhodesia 1930-1970, with Special Reference to Lower Courts' (PhD, University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies, 1995), pp. 78, 77.
56. See the correspondence between the Administrator, Attorney-General and CNC in N3/28/11.
57. Smith, 'The Struggle to Control Dispute Proceedings', pp. 169--70. On NCs' views of Africans and the use of legal powers also see pp. 163, 169-71, 180-81 as well as his general discussion of NCs' judicial power in Chapter 2, passim.
58. N3/28/11: SON, Fort Victoria to CNC, 23 June 1922.
59. A3/18/31/3: Attorney-General Tredgold to His Honour The Administrator, 29 November 1910.
60. The question of settlers' violent attempts to control perceived acts of insolence is beyond the narrow scope of this article, which analyses government workers only. However, see T.O. Ranger, 'Tales of the "Wild West": Gold Diggers and Rustlers in South-West Zimbabwe, 1898-1940: An Essay on the Use of Criminal Court Records for Social History', South African Historical Journal, 28 (1993), pp. 40-62.
61. A3/18/31/3: Secretary to the Administrator to His Honour The Administrator, Memorandum, 26 February 1910.
62. A3/18/31/3: W.H. Milton, Administrator to Resident Commissioner, 5 April 1919, quoting the Attorney- General.
63. A3/18/31/3: Attorney-General Tredgold to His Honour The Administrator, 1 March 1910.
64. The Department of Justice in South Africa also argued that NCs' authority rested on paternal power. Evans, Bureaucracy and Race, p. 170.
65. S138/260, 1926-1928: E.G. Howman, NC, Sinoia, to CNC, 20 December 1926.
66. The key case for NCs was High Court Decisions, 1923, Rex v. Zimidzi and Dabira, p. 139, which overturned Col. Carbutt's 'reasonable' order to an African. Carbutt was personally offended and pained by the ruling: N3/28/11: Secretary, Department of the Administrator to His Honour, 16 March 1923.
67. Other relevant acts included the Native Juveniles Employment Act, 1927, the Native Law and Courts Act, 1927, the Native Council Act, 1937, and the 1930 Land Apportionment Act. For broad overviews of this legislation see M.C. Steele's, 'The Foundations of "Native" Policy: Southern Rhodesia, 1923-1933' (PhD, Simon Fraser University, 1972) and Smith, 'The Struggle to Control Dispute Proceedings'.
68. See Legislative Debates, 2 June 1927, Mr. Gillfillan, p. 1,100
69. Also see S138/260, 1926-1928, R. McIlwaine, Solicitor General, to the Attorney-General, 'Suggested Amendments to the Native Regulations (Proclamation No. 55, 1910)', 9 September 1926, which uses much of the same language.
70. The idea of a schoolmaster was more than a metaphor for many NCs, many of whom understood Africans from the perspective of their own schooldays. D. Jeater, 'Imagining Africans: Scholarship, Fantasy, and Science in Colonial Administration, 1920s Southern Rhodesia', International Journal of African Historical Studies, 38, 1 (2005), pp. 1-26.
71. R. Waller provides a useful overview of recent literature on youth in Africa in his 'Rebellious Youth in Colonial Africa', Journal of African History, 47, 1 (2006), pp. 77-92.
72. Also see in the same issue of the Journal of African History, C. Summers, "Subterranean Evil" and "Tumultuous Riot" in Buganda: Authority and Alienation at King's College, Budo, 1942', pp. 93-114
73. and L. Fourchad, 'Lagos and the Invention of Juvenile Delinquency in Nigeria, 1920-60', pp. 115-37. A good starting point for linking generational challenges to elders' authority and manners is B. Carton, Blood from your Children (Charlottesville, University of Virginia, 2000).
74. Summers, Colonial Lessons, Chapter 1.
75. S138/37: 2nd Annual Conference of Native Commissioners of Matabeleland, 1926, Suggestions of C.T. Stuart, Annexure A.
76. Howman was one of six NCs on a sub-committee appointed to recommend changes to the Native Regulations.
77. S138/260, 1926-1928: E.G. Howman, NC, Sinoia, to CNC, 16 February 1926, p. 4.
78. Ibid.
79. On the potent metaphor of Shaka see C. Hamilton's excellent work, Terrific Majesty (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1998).
80. S138/260, 1926-1928: E.G. Howman, NC, Sinoia, to CNC, 20 December 1926.
81. Ibid.
82. S138/260, 1926-1928: 20 December 1927, House of Commons Debate, Columns 371-3.
83. See S138/260, 1926-1928: John White, President, and Latimer P. Hardaker, Secretary, S. Rhodesian Missionary Conference to Right Honourable Minister of Native Affairs, 30 September 1927; Copy of S. Rhodesia Missionary Conference resolution on the NAA attached to Latimer to Secretary to the Premier, 8 September 1927; Anti-slavery and Aborigines Protection Society, Travers Buxton, Honourable Secretary, and John White, Parliamentary Secretary to Governor J.R. Chancellor, 15 March 1928.
84. S138/260, 1926-1928: Rev. Canon Edgar W. Lloyd, St. Faiths Mission to Sir Charles P.T. Coghlan, Minister of Native Affairs, 24 August 1927.
85. S138/260, 1926-1928: Premier Coghlan to the Attorney-General, Minute, 5 April 1927.
86. Section 21 of the NAA, 1927. Steele notes that the Appeals Court established to hear cases from Africans was but rarely used. See Steele, 'The Foundations of "Native" Policy', p. 137.
87. On critiques of NC's legal work see S138/43, 1928-1931, CNC to SON, Fort Victoria, 28 March 1929.
88. S2863/1: Mt. Darwin criminal cases, 4 January 1954-12 May 1954, Rex v. Rezen.
89. F. Bound, '"An Angry and Malicious Mind"? Narratives of Slander at the Church Courts of York, c.1660-c.1760', History Workshop Journal, 56 (2003), p. 66.
90. High Court Decisions, 1912: Rex v. Guthrie and Rex v. Isaac, pp. 10-14.
91. Ibid., p. 12.
92. Ibid., p. 13.
93. Ibid., p. 14. For a similar conclusion see S138/43, 1928-31: CNC to SON, Matabeleland, 23 October 1928 (regarding King v. Mtshena). Mtshena had been charged with insolence for his outburst during a meeting. Despite the multiple and serious problems with the case - there was no judgment, plea or charge - the CNC concluded that 'the best judge of the fact that insolence was intended' was the NC although Africans have 'latitude customarily' when at meetings 'at which extreme views and sentiments are often uttered without insolence being intended'.
94. As James C. Scott reminds us, interpretations of insubordination are not personal or dependent on mood so much as they are political acts meant to repair broken lines of power or consensus. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance (New Haven, CN, Yale University Press, 1990), p. 206 and passim.
95. In two cases women were charged with contempt: One for giving her brother her lobola money and refusing to return to her husband, and the other, for refusing to return children to her husband, claiming that he was not their father. S138/43, 1931-1934: CNC to the Secretary, Law Department, 8 Oct. 1932, Rex v. Manododo; S1041, 1935-1946: Rex v. Ngonya, 3 October 1945. The insolence in these cases amounted to the women disobeying the order of NCs and upsetting what authorities believed were the proper gender roles of African men and women. In a third case, one Muntumuni was convicted of insolence because she adhered too closely to her presumed gender role: She did not report her two cattle to the dip attendant, because, she said, as a woman she could not drive the animals to the dip. S2836/3: Regina v. Muntumuni (f), 15 March 1954. And, finally, in 1945 an African policeman charged Emite, a woman from Nyasaland, with insolence for insulting him by saying, 'I shall see you'. S2258, 1944-46, Rex v. Emite, 9 October 1945. The NC judged Emite not guilty.
96. D. Jeater, Marriage, Perversion, and Power (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1993)
97. E. Schmidt, Peasants, Traders, and Wives (Portsmouth, NH, Heinemann, 1992), Chapter 3
98. Barnes, 'We Women Worked So Hard', Chapter 2.
99. The insolence cases are 'strikingly formulaic' in their emotional vocabulary. See Bound, '"An Angry and Malicious Mind"?', p. 61.
100. S2886/1: Rex v. Tamubla, 30 March 1935; S2191, 367/37-588/37, Rex v. Chihangira Albert Nkomo, 8 June 1937; S1041, 1935-46: Rex v. Shoniwa, 9 November 1945; S3044/6: Rex v. Shankululu, 7 January 1947; S2863/3 Regina v. Matiyesi, 7 October 1955; S1046 1930-1949: Rex v. Muziti. Cases in which the defendant 'threw' a letter or note to the ground include, S3146/1: Rex v. Tsuru Ndoro, 10 March 1948; S2191 1/47-475/47: Rex v. Tarisai, 4 October 1947; S3044/6: Rex v. Shankululu, 7 January 1947 (cited above).
101. S3146/2: Rex v. Jim, 14 November 1952; Testimony of Clifford Pickard. Also see S633, 1918-1935: Rex v. Maplanke, 17 February 1933 and, for 'making fun' of a headman's 'big stomach', S3044/5: The King v. Ndumo, 9 January 1946.
102. Bound, '"An Angry and Malicious Mind"?', p. 72.
103. S1542/C16/2: Ordinary Jurisdiction, Rex v. Majuta, 6 April 1934, attached to CNC Carbutt to Minister of Native Affairs, 15 November 1934. The NC suspected Majuta of being a member of the ICU.
104. S2863/1: Mt. Darwin criminal cases, 4 January 1954-12 May 1954, Rex v. Rezen, 11 January 1954. The Soil Conservation Officer, one Vengesayi, a chiShona speaker, confirmed Rezen's insolence by stating that his voice rose to a 'high tone' and that his 'face showed me he was very angry'.
105. See S138/43, 1928-1931: NC, Marandellas to CNC, 24 September 1929; S1542/ C16/2, 1934, CNC to Minister for Native Affairs, 15 November 1934; S2191, 2/44-546/44 (1944): Rex v. Mahike, Ziremo, Matigwadza, Chitando, Makusha, Muwongomera, Nongayi, Mashawi, 7 July 1944.
106. S633, 1918-1935: H. Jackson, SON, Matabeleland, Rex v. Ntola, Remarks by the Presiding Judicial Officer, 7 June 1920; S138/43, 1928-31: NC, Ft. Usher to SON/Matabeleland, 18 October 1929; S2886/1: Rex v. Chief Madamwa (Mloyi), 2 April 1935. Also see Native Appeal Court, Reports and Decisions, 1928-1947, Rex v. Kaitano, 2 December 1946.
107. 'Took off coat': S2836/1: Rex v. Thomas, 14 May 1947; S2865/1: Rex v. Madziba, 24 June 1952; 'Rolled up sleeves': S2869/1: Regina v. Tafirenyika, 29 April 1954; S2836/2: The King v. Jonathan, 3 January 1952; S2836/1: Rex v. Melekwa, 2 June 1948; Physical threats: S2869/1: Regina v. Tafirenyika, 29 April 1954; S2258 1927-36, Rex v. Ragu, 23 October 1930; S2886/2: Rex v. Hosani 11 February 1943. Bawdy language: NSA 2/6/1/1: Rex v. Gatsi, 7 October 1913; S1041, 1935-46: Rex v. Ndira, 5 August 1938; S1041, 1935-46: Rex v. Hapiye, 22 August 1938; S2191, 1/39-205/39: Rex v. Kayela, 26 May 1939; S3044/4: Rex v. Nduna, 8 December 1944; S2836/2: Rex v. Zakeyu, 14 April 1949; S2869/11: Regina v. John 9 October 1957 (towards a chief). 'Bloody shit': S1976, 1942: The King v. Matanga, 3 October 1946; 'Your mother's private parts': S2869/11: Regina v. John, 9 October 1957. Other cases of insults include, S3146/1: Rex v. Jameson, 5 April 1949; S2836/1: Rex v. NgazimbaΨohn, 1 November 1946.
108. D. Paton, No Bond but the Law: Punishment, Race, and Gender in Jamaican State Formation, 1780-1870 (Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 2004), p. 72.
109. S138/41, 1926-1931, Premier, H.U. Moffat, 'A.N.C. Tapson & Complaint from Native', 23 March 1931.
110. This rhetoric echoes the 'hydraulic' model of explosive emotions that Rosenwein criticises in 'Worrying about Emotions in History', pp. 834-6.
111. S2836/2: Rex v. Faraka, 31 May 1949.
112. S1041, 1935-46: Rex v. Mchapondwa Tapera, 15 April 1946.
113. S3044/6: Rex v. Shankululu, 7 January 1947.
114. S3146/2: Office of the Clerk of the Court to Civil Commissioner and Magistrate, 16 January 1951; S3146/2: Rex v. Zanyanya, 13 January 1951.
115. A common defence was drunkenness, and though this never exonerated a defendant, in at least one case it did result in a reduced sentence on appeal. Native Appeal Court: Appeal Cases, Vol. III, Part III, Rex v. Mubaiwa, 13 October 1949, pp. 31-2. With the introduction of handcuffs some Africans began to argue that they could not have been contemptuous because police never handcuffed them. S2191, 1/43-558/43: Rex v. Mwesu, 20 January 1943; S2863/1, Rex v. Rezen, 11 January 1954.
116. S2191 1/47-475/47: Rex v. Bobo, 2 December 1947.
117. On scenes see Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, especially Chapter 6.
118. S3146/2: Rex v. Zanyanya, 13 January 1951. Also see S3146/2: Office of the Clark of the Court to Civil Commissioner and Magistrate, 16 January 1951 and S3146/2: NC, Salisbury to Registrar, Native Appeals Court, 24 January 1951. For other cases see S1041, 1935-1946: Rex v. Fani, 23 December 1942; S2191, 367/37- 588/37: Rex v. Chihangira Albert Nkomo, 8 June 1937.
119. S2836/2: The King v. Gcwalimuzi and Levi, 9 April 1952; for a similar case of long, though not physical, provocation see S2191, 2/ 44-546/44 (1944): Rex v. Mahike, Ziremo, Matigwadza, Chitando, Makusha, Muwongomera, Nongayi, Mashawi, 7 July 1944. Court records translate 'satanyoko' as 'your mother's private parts'.
120. S2836/2: The King v. Gcwalimuzi and Levi, 9 April 1952.
121. Some officials complained that Africans had tried to goad them into anger. S3142/2/5: Regina v. Mafinwa, 31 July 1957. Also see S2836/ 2: The King v. Gcwalimuzi and Levi, 9 April 1952.
122. S138/41, 1926-1931, Premier, H.U. Moffat, 'A.N.C. Tapson & Complaint from Native', memo, 23 March 1931.
123. Northern Nigerian officials dealt with the scandals arising from flogging cases, for insolence for instance, by keeping meticulously documented legal procedures that suggested sober, judicial fairness. See S. Pierce, 'Punishment and the Political Body: Flogging and Colonialism in Northern Nigeria', in S. Pierce and A. Rao (eds), Discipline and the Other Body (Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 2006), pp. 190-91.
124. S1041: Rex v. Fani, 23 December 1942.
125. S138/43, 1928-1931: Charles Bullock, Acting CNC, Circular, 29 July 1932, 'Cases under the Native Affairs Act of 1927'.
126. S138/43, 1928-1931, CNC to SON, Fort Victoria, 28 March 1929. Also see S138/43, 1928-1931, CNC to NC, Mazoe, 11 January 1929 and Attorney-General, Opinion No. 17, 1929, 30 January 1929.
127. Paton, No Bond but the Law, p. 69, see pp. 67-9.
128. See the Marandellas NC's letter of protest about an appeal from an African convicted in his court in S138/41 1926-31: NC, Marandellas to CNC, 21 August 1929.
129. Paton, No Bond but the Law, p. 68.
130. S2191, 1/39-205/39, Rex v. Kayela, 26 May 1939, testimony of Tomokayi.
131. S2836/1: Rex v. Melekwa, 2 June 1948.
132. S2191, 1/39-205/39: Rex v. Kayela, 26 May 1939. Also see S2836/1: Rex v. Hamandishe, 2 December 1947.
133. S2258, 1944-46: Rex v. Siyahamba, 13 August 1946.
134. Many interpreters in French Soudan were former slaves. E. Osborn, '"Circle of Iron" African Colonial Employees and the Interpretation of Colonial Rule in French West Africa', Journal of African History, 44, 1 (2003), p. 39.
135. S2191, 1/39-205/39: Rex v. Kayela, 26 May 1939, testimony of Tomokayi.
136. Waller, 'Rebellious Youth', pp. 81-4.
137. S2836/1: Rex v. Ngano, 2 August 1947. The remainder of the paragraph is from this source. Scales were very sensitive items for African peoples, since historically store clerks used faulty measuring devices to deceive people.
138. See Burke, Lifebuoy Men, Lux Women, Chapter 3.
139. West, The Rise of an African Middle Class, Chapter 3.
140. S2258, 1927-1936: Rex v. Kumbumjani, 11 December 1933 and Rex v. Elijah, 11 December 1933. The following narrative is based on these cases. Elijah's case was dismissed because he obeyed the constable's orders to be quiet. In addition, the constable's wife testified that she was not sure whether he called her a prostitute.
141. S2258, 1927-1936: Rex v. Kumbumjani, 11 December 1933, testimony of Native Constable Mushambi.
142. Barnes, 'We Women Worked so Hard', pp. 128-34.
143. Also see L. White, The Comforts of Home (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1990).
144. Barnes, 'We Women Worked so Hard', pp. 117-18.
145. Questioning sexual propriety sometimes resulted in defamation cases. See S2064/1941-1943: Zwemisha v. Gurai, 25 May 1943
146. and Iliffe, Honour in African History, pp. 159-60.
147. See Summers, Colonial Lessons, pp. 28-39.
148. S1041, 1935-1946: Acting NC, Salisbury to CNC, 24 December 1942.
149. See F. Colonna, 'Educating Conformity in French Colonial Algeria', in Stoler and Cooper (eds), Tensions of Empire, pp. 364-5.
150. Review Cases, Vol. III, Part III, 1948: Rex v. Zenzo, 22 July 1948, pp. 27-8.
151. Native Appeal Court, Reports and Decisions, 1928-1947, Rex v. Kaitano 2 December 1946.
152. Review Cases, Vol. III, Part III, 1948: Rex v. Zenzo, 22 July 1948, pp. 27-28. Also see ANC the correspondence about Tapson's attack on the hat-wearing Lennox Njokweni in S138/41 1926-1931. For another case about hats see S3146/1, 1947-1949: Rex v. Mapfumo, 1 December 1949.
153. Review Cases, Vol. III, Part III, 1948: Rex v. Zenzo, 22 July 1948, pp. 27-28.
154. S2809/13: Capt. A. J. Frost, Staff Officer to Commissioner of Police, Circular, 31 October 1949, attached to Lt. Col. Hickman for Commissioner of Police to CNC, 5 August 1950.
155. West, The Rise of an African Middle Class, Part One especially.
156. B.J. Mnyanda, In Search of Truth (Bombay, Hind Kitabs Ltd., 1954), pp. 98-9.
157. Ibid., p. 42.
158. Ibid., p. 97.
159. Ibid., p. 98.
160. For an overview of this period see West, The Rise of an African Middle Class, Chapter 8.
161. Mehta, 'Liberal Strategies of Exclusion'.
162. N. Shamuyarira, Crisis in Rhodesia (London, Andre Deutsch, 1965), pp. 42-3.
163. And see West, The Rise of an African Middle Class, pp. 216-17.
164. Palley, The Constitutional History, p. 605.
165. S2809/13: For S.E. Morris, Secretary, Native Affairs to Minister, 15 July 1957.
166. Report of the Commission to Inquire on the Administration and Judicial Functions in the Native Affairs and District Courts Department (Salisbury, Government Printer, 1961), para 72, 119, 112.
167. Report of the Commission, para 104. Also see WO 6/1/1/22: Federation of Women's Institutes of Southern Rhodesia, containing the Report of the National Convention of Southern Rhodesia, which reported that convention delegates agreed that the NAA had caused 'a growing disrespect for the law ... ', p. 13.
168. Report of the Commission, para 114-15.
169. Ibid., para 116-17.
170. P. Nielsen, The Colour Bar (Cape Town, Juta & Co., 1937; reprint, New York, Negro Universities Press, 1970), p. 108.
171. See Paton, No Bond But the Law, pp. 64-9.
172. On forgotten political alternatives see F. Cooper, Africa Since 1940: The Past of the Present (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002), Chapter 2. On 'traces' of liberalism in the thoughts and concerns of nationalists in the mid-1970s.
173. See L. White, The Assassination of Herbert Chitepo: Texts and Politics in Zimbabwe (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2003), especially pp. 70-71.