Abstract:
This paper is primarily concerned with the ways in which white
men and women - mainly the latter - interacted with their
African, coloured and Indian domestic servants in the second half
of the nineteenth century. Its second concern is to argue that
the study of this (and related) topics is of considerable,
importance in the causation of the oppressive forms which South
African states and social orders have taken.
The topic of this paper is situated at the intersection of two
areas which have been largely neglected in South African
historiography. While the attitudes and experiences of "ordinary"
African people in nineteenth and twentieth century South Africa
have received considerable (and distinguished) attention in the
last twenty years, comparatively little "history from below" has
been written about whites, whether "Boer" or "Briton." Equally,
while nineteenth century European, American and British empire
domestic service has been fairly extensively examined, this is
a relatively neglected area of South African historiography.
