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| Title: | From Rituals of Rapture to Dependence: The Political Economy of Khoikhoi Narcotic Consumption, c.1487-1870 |
| Author: | Gordon, David |
| Year: | 1996 |
| Periodical: | South African Historical Journal |
| Issue: | 35 |
| Period: | May |
| Pages: | 62-88 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | South Africa |
| Subjects: | Khoikhoi drug use drugs History and Exploration Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Health and Nutrition Economics and Trade |
| External link: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02582479608671247 |
| Abstract: | This article examines narcotic consumption among the Khoikhoi of South Africa in the period c. 1487-1870. Much economic activity prior to the establishment of the Dutch East India Company's (VOC) trading post in 1652 centred on the supply of pyschoactive substances such as 'canna' or 'dagga', which led to the rise of powerful inland lords. With the onset of trade with the VOC, new drugs began to play an important role in trading transactions. The Dutch used alcohol as a 'treat' to honour and calm the Khoikhoi so that they would consent to trade. Tobacco, along with copper, became the most important trading item that the VOC offered in exchange for livestock. By the late 17th century these drugs had introduced new psychoactive experiences which were grafted onto older traditions of narcotic consumption. Narcotics then eased the traumatic emasculation that the Khoikhoi suffered as they lost their previously independent pastoral existence and gradually joined imported slaves in settler households and on wine and wheat estates. On these estates, narcotic consumption was more a sign and tool of the economic and social degradation of rural workers than a form of resistance to their overlords. Notes, ref. |
