Work and control in a citrus packhouse: Zebediela Estate, 1926-1953

Abstract

An earlier paper discussed the social origins of white women workers at Zebediela. These women were young, Afrikaans-speaking, and came largely from small farms in the Northern Transvaal (1). Their social characteristics - age, gender, 'culture' - profoundly shaped the experience of work at Zebediela. It is on this experience that this paper focuses. The paper decribes the labour process in the Zebediela packhouse, concentrating specifically on control and stabilisation of labour. It examines changes in the nature of work as production increased and the availability of young white women workers declined. These two processes intensified labour in the packhouse, and transformed management's strategies of control.