Communities at the Margin: Studies in Rural Society and Migration in Southern Africa, 1890-1980

Abstract

The practice of social history is particularly advanced by the publication of collective volumes each consisting of fairly diverse studies. An outstanding feature of these publications is the comprehensive introductions in which historiographical, theoretical and comparative frameworks are provided. Communities at the margin: Studies in rural society and migration in southern Africa, 1890-1980 forms part of this valuable body of work. The authors are well-known scholars of African studies and African history, and the title makes an original contribution to research in these fields. The main focus of the work is on the struggle of communities at the margin of dispossession in colonial and post-colonial societies of Southern Africa. Although centred on the weak and impoverished, it tries to go beyond viewing them as victims. The aim is to form an understanding of the role and perspectives of those who lived their lives outside racial and ethnic elites, far from colonial capitals, and away from centres of white economic empowerment. According to the editors, these studies attempt to provide further evidence that the actions of the rural communities, no less than policies imposed from the colonial or industrial metropole, shaped the terms on which white rule and capitalist industrialisation developed throughout the African continent, but specifically in southern Africa.