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The Normalisation of Afrikaner Settlement in German South West Africa, 1884-1914
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4603110 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Robbie Aitken (0000-0002-3332-3063, University of Liverpool, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2007 |
| Volume | 33 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 343-360 |
| Publication date | 2007-06-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Southern African Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0305-7070 • E-ISSN: 1465-3893 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/03057070701292632 |
| OpenAlex | W1989106844 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
This article explores Afrikaner immigration into German South West Africa during the period of German colonialism, 1884–1914. It focuses on the response of the German colonial authorities in Windhoek and in Berlin to the prospect of large-scale Afrikaner immigration as well as the representation of Afrikaners in German colonial discourse. German justifications of colonial rule were psychologically supported by notions of the imagined cultural and racial differences between the colonisers and the colonised. These underpinned the construction of a polarised self/other, white/black dichotomy and separated the indigenous Africans and Europeans into distinct categories of identification. The presence of settlers whose cultural practices and lifestyle did not match with the norms attributed to the desirable settler threatened to undermine the boundaries of difference between the coloniser and colonised. Some elements of the German government as well as the colonial press envisaged Afrikaner immigrants as a potential threat to continued German control over the colony. Others welcomed the immigration of the Afrikaners as colonial pioneers. The categories of black and white were deployed and reconstructed in order to assess the desirability of Afrikaner groups, leading to their assimilation or exclusion from settler society, and underlining the organising power of the schema. Cultural markers and economic considerations were used to differentiate desirable Afrikaner settlers from those deemed undesirable. Undesirable Afrikaner immigrants were discursively blackened through the use of racial rhetoric as well as being politically excluded from access to resources and land, and even physically excluded from the colony. In contrast, desirable settlers were welcomed and Germanised. Afrikaner immigration was illustrative of the constant negotiation of categories of identification and the utilisation of a notion of whiteness in creating an exclusive settler society
Colonialism · Ethnology · German · Immigration · Indigenous · Political science · Racism · Sociology · White (mutation · Gender Studies · German Colonialism and Identity Studies · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Law
| Citations per year | 0.33 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2008 - 2021 (14) |
| Highly cited | No |