Confinement and beyond: space, mobility, and connections in two Mau Mau detention memoirs

Abstract

This contribution analyzes two detention diaries, by J. M. Kariuki (Mau Mau Detainee: The Account by a Kenya African of His Experiences in the Detention Camps 1953–1960. Oxford University Press, 1963) and Gakaara wa Wanjaũ (Mwandĩki wa Mau Mau Ithaamĩrio-Inĩ. Heinemann, 1983), that interpret life in the colonial camps in Kenya in the 1950s. Focusing on aspects of movement, camp landscapes, sociability, bodily degradation, writing and the mobility of materials, the article shows that colonial policy aimed at a process of reducing prisoners to “bare persons,” while detainees attempted to stay as close to their social networks and themselves as possible. In the constant struggle and negotiation over mobility, connections and communication, camp personnel and prisoners do not appear as homogeneous groups. Clearly Mau Mau’s detention camps were horrible places with often extremely violent conditions. Yet, a simplified, dichotomous analysis stands in the way of understanding the capricious nature of colonial practice, and reduces the detainees to their status as detainees, while they aimed precisely to overcome the spatial and bodily restrictions imposed, attempting to connect beyond the camps.