5 - Colonial Power, Community Identity, and Consultation

Summary

Instead of distancing colonial authority figures from the African communities they governed, of seeing these groups as mutually exclusive, this chapter seeks to situate these officials in the communities they served and understand how their behavior was consequently affected. European teachers and colonial officers, as well as their intermediaries, consulted with the various communities which made up Bagamoyo and, in particular, paid respect to elders and parents. This focus on colonial-African relations complicates our image of imperial rule: far from a style of administration characterized by social distancing, some colonial officials ultimately became immersed in the social codes of the communities they were supposed to dominate. This chapter provides a comparative examination of this phenomenon through two rounds of European colonialism in Tanganyika: the German and British empires. It examines issues such as urban planning, taxation, slavery, racial identification, colonial administration, and school enrollment.