Kimberley's closed compounds: a model for Southern African compounds
Date
1982-09-13
Authors
Turrell, Rob
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Abstract
While it is by now conventional wisdom that the compound
'provided the framework for the total exploitation of ...
black workers', (1) it has often been assumed by historians
that the late nineteenth century closed compounds at
Kimberley provided a superior material and social
environment to their imitators on the Rand and in Southern
Rhodesia (2). This assumption has been based on diamond mine
owners' claims to have created an attractive social
microcosm in their compounds, in which African workers were
forced to spend their non-working lives for the duration of
a contract. Moreover, the mine owners argued that it was
these model social welfare compounds that compensated for a
worker's loss of freedom. And it was a measure of the
validity of their claim, they continued, that the mines never
went short of labour and thus did not need to resort to
labour recruitment, (3).
This view of model diamond compounds in the 1880s and
1890s is a mine owner's myth. In the areas of accommodation,
diet and health care, early Kimberley compounds were not
markedly superior to the standards found in early Rand and
Southern Rhodesian compounds. Van Onselen has compared
conditions in these latter two mining regions and shown
that, of the two, Rhodesian compounds were worse.
Description
African Studies Seminar series. Paper presented 13 September, 1982
Keywords
Miners. South Africa. Kimberley, Migrant labor. Housing. South Africa, Miners. Housing. South Africa