AfricaBib 
bibliographic database
| Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
 Periodical article |
 Leiden University catalogue |
 WorldCat |
| Title: | Urges in the Colony. Men and Women in Colonial Windhoek, 1890-1905 |
| Author: | Hartmann, Wolfram |
| Year: | 2007 |
| Periodical: | Journal of Namibian Studies |
| Issue: | 1 |
| Pages: | 39-71 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Namibia |
| Subjects: | sexuality sexual offences colonial period Urbanization and Migration History and Exploration colonialism Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Women's Issues Ethnic and Race Relations Historical/Biographical Cultural Roles urbanization |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the sexual economy of the quasi-urban context of early colonial Windhoek, Namibia, a settlement characterized by the dominating presence of the German colonial military, during the first two to three decades of colonial control. Colonizing men's and colonized women's sexual interaction is explored in the different spatial and social settings of an incipient colonial settlement. This encounter was characterized by violence and consent. It was mainly transient, yet sometimes permanent, and took place in the context of various commercial and other arrangements, at times even offering an economic niche for enterprising women. Consensual sexual interaction between local (Herero) women and colonial men happened mainly in two areas: prostitution and concubinage. The number of marriages between German men and indigenous women remained remarkably low over the years. Violent sexual relations are mainly traced through records on the prisoner-of-war camps and compounds. The outbreak of the German-Herero war in 1904 did not substantially change the pattern of sexual interaction, which was mainly violent. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. [Journal abstract, edited] |