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- Convenors:
-
Claudia Berger
(Erfurt University)
Stephanie Zehnle (University of Kiel)
Send message to Convenors
- Discussants:
-
Claudia Berger
(Erfurt University)
Sarah Ehlers (Deutsches MuseumLMU Munich)
Perseverence Madhuku (University of Bayreuth)
Klemens Wedekind (Hildesheim University)
Dennis Yazici (Kiel University)
- Format:
- Panel
- Stream:
- Linguistic and visual (de)colonialisms
- Location:
- Room 1015
- Sessions:
- Wednesday 8 June, -
Time zone: Europe/Berlin
Short Abstract:
This panel explores the rarely discussed connection between human and/or animal disease and media visualisation, particularly cartography, in Africa's past.
Long Abstract:
Epidemic diseases on the African continent were a defining theme of European colonialism. Firstly, epidemics were fuelled by different variants of colonial mobility and activities, secondly, some epidemics opposed colonisation by weakening and killing European staff and livestock, and thirdly epidemics served as a legitimising argument in favour of colonisation. The reality of epidemic diseases for humans and animals, as well as the representation of the 'nature - culture' nexus in visual media, will be discussed in this panel. To what extent, for example, did the need to be able to assess the risk of such diseases for expansion and economic exploitation influence mapping strategies found in colonial cartography? Which kind of visualisation strategies did authors of colonial cartography choose, and what kind of human-animal relations were they based on? How was cartography influenced by other genres of colonial scientific and health communication? Which perceptions of territoriality were supported or contradicted by the maps or by the experience on the ground? This panel takes a multi-perspective approach to the problem of epidemic diseases in a colonial African setting and invites us to take a closer look at colonial visualisation strategies concerning disease and the environment.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Wednesday 8 June, 2022, -Paper short abstract:
This paper examines the negotiation and creation of colonial borders in German Southwest Africa in the face of the threat of the rinderpest that threatened the entire cattle economy of the german colony.
Paper long abstract:
In the history of German rule in colonial Namibia, cattle breeding played a central role in the establishment of a settler colony. When the threatening news of the introduction of the devastating rinderpest hit the German colony in 1896, a border line was established to prevent the spread of the cattle plague from the Ovambo region to the north and the British colony of Bechuanaland to the east. The resulting border line against rinderpest is the historical example of a colonial border that was constructed under local conditions on the ground and was not an armchair product like many other colonial borders. In the context of the demarcation line, the territoriality of German colonial rule in the colony was renegotiated or rather defined for the first time in specific regions. When the border line was established, border posts were erected, which were intended to prevent the total control of animals and humans. The selection of border posts for the line of demarcation was determined by local environmental factors such as water points, and local indigenous knowledge was also used to implement control.
The paper thus makes a historical contribution to the extent to which local, colonial territoriality and its borders were negotiated and defined by epidemic diseases such as rinderpest in German Southwest Africa.
Paper short abstract:
Though an exploration of fence construction and vermin extermination, this paper shows how agricultural technology under apartheid transformed labour relations and entrenched racial inequalities during the twentieth century in Namibia.
Paper long abstract:
Agriculture under apartheid depended upon the transformation of landscapes into ones which facilitated profitability and racial exclusivity. While many studies have considered the legal infrastructure of apartheid agriculture in Namibia and South Africa - such as those dividing white commerical areas from 'native reserves' - this paper explores technological transformations within farming areas in southern Namibia which entrenched raical hierarchies. Though an exploration of fence construction and vermin extermination, this paper shows how agricultural technology under apartheid transformed labour relations and entrenched racial inequalities during the twentieth century in Namibia.
Paper short abstract:
This paper examies the implementation of the official livestock registration in Namibia in order to show how veterinary policy was embedded in techniques of colonial control and to shed further light on institutional continuities of colonial rule in Namibia.
Paper long abstract:
In Namibia, just like in other settler colonies of sub-Saharan Africa, the European colonial system was literally built on the backs of horses, cattle, and sheep. Horses were used largely for personal transport and military purposes. Providing meat, milk and wool, cattle and sheep formed the backbone of commercial as well as subsistence economies. Furthermore, the whole colonial transport system relied on ox-wagons. Due to this central role of livestock, animal diseases formed a major threat for the colonial rule in southern Africa.
Until today quarantine measures and vaccination campaigns form the key elements to combat animal diseases. To carry out these measures veterinarians must be able to determine the origin and ownership of animals.
In Namibia both settler and black livestock owners had marked their animals with branding irons to indicate ownership at least since the 1850s. As these marks followed no standardized procedure this system allowed neither a reliable identification of ownership nor an effective supervision of veterinary control measures. To solve this complex set of problems the German and South African colonial administration issued three Cattle Brand Acts between 1912 and 1923.
This paper examies the implementation of the official livestock registration in Namibia in order to show how veterinary policy was embedded in techniques of colonial control and to shed further light on institutional continuities of colonial rule in Namibia.