We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 July 2011
It is all too often assumed that African nationalism is a product of very recent manufacture. One supposes that World War II and its aftermath brought about new forces of change, loosely called “nationalism,” which in a few short years swept African prison graduates into undreamed of positions of power and world importance. To some extent, of course, this presumption is correct: those elements of change unleashed by the war and by the subsequent estrangement of two of the victors did indeed accelerate the emergence of popular movements in Africa south of the Sahara. More rapidly than even the aspirants themselves could have hoped, colonial powers made it evident that freedom could be obtained for the agitation.
1 Lord Hailey prefers “Africanism,” and James Coleman gives “nationalism” restricted usage. For an excellent and thorough discussion, with further references, see Kilson, Martin, “The Analysis of African Nationalism,” World Politics, X (April 1958), 484–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
2 There is no need to detail the “Maji-Maji” rebellion in German East Africa, the Nyasaland Rising of 1915, or any of a large number of less well-known revolts that have been a regular concomitant of colonial rule.
3 Hodgkin, Thomas, Nationalism in Colonial Africa (London 1956), 84.Google Scholar
4 P. J. Silawe to Secretary for Native Affairs, 25 August 1930, SEC/NAT/324, National Archives, Lusaka.
5 See Bennett, George, “The Development of Political Organizations in Kenya,” Political Studies, V (June 1957), 113–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
6 Cf. Ottenberg, Simon, “Improvement Associations Among the Afikpo Ibo,” Africa, XXV (January 1955), 1–28CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Busia, K. A., Social Survey of Sekpndi-Takoradi (Accra 1950).Google Scholar
7 “The lit end of a cigarette in a woman's mouth is a sure sign of a prostitute plying for hire.” Recurrent phrase in the minutes of the Ramogi African Welfare Association, 1945–1947. It is incorporated in the 1955 bylaws of the Luo Union, held ultra vires by the District Commissioner, Kisumu. Kisumu Archives.
8 Kikuyu Association to the East African Royal Commission, 1924. Kenya Archives.
9 “… in East Africa [I had] the rare experience of dealing with a tabula rasa, an almost untouched and sparsely inhabited country, where we could do as we will[ed], regulate immigration, and open or close the door as seem[ed] best. …” Eliot, Charles, The East Africa Protectorate (London 1905), 3.Google Scholar For an excellent summary of evidence and relevant literature, see Kilson, Martin, “Land and Politics in Kenya,” Western Political Quarterly, x (September 1957), 559–81.Google Scholar
10 In 1897 the government admitted the principle of individual ownership of land and issued regulations respecting the sale of land by Africans. See Regulation No. 12 (1897), issued 8 July 1897. Copy in Kenya Archives.
11 Kikuyu Association Memorandum presented to the East African Royal Commission, November 1924. Copy in Kenya Archives.
12 Kikuyu Association to the East African Royal Commission, 1924.
13 George Delf, Kenyatta's unofficial biographer, was unable to talk with Kenyatta himself, but his book, Jomo Kenyatta (London 1961), is useful for a superficial outline of Kenyatta's life. Kenyatta was reluctant to discuss his early activities with me, but Thuku was both willing and articulate (11–12 September 1961).
14 For an early breakdown, minutes of 21 December 1935, SEC/NAT/311, National Archives, Lusaka.
15 Cf. Church, L. F., The Early Methodist People (London 1948)Google Scholar; and J. L. and Hammond, Barbara, The Town Labourer, 1760–1832 (London 1917), ii.Google Scholar
16 Minutes of meeting of Welfare Societies at Kafue, 10–11 July 1934.
17 Minutes of Livingstone Welfare Association, 5 May, 7 July 1934.
18 Chief Secretary's circular minute, 4 September 1933, and Chief Secretary's minutes, 21 February 1946, SEC/NAT/311, National Archives, Lusaka.
19 Chief Secretary to Secretary for Native Affairs, 24 February 1931, SEC/NAT/321, National Archives, Lusaka.
20 Sundkler, Bengt G. M., Bantu Prophets in South Africa (London 1948), 297.Google Scholar
21 Mair, Lucy, “Independent Religious Movements in Three Continents,” Comparative Studies in Society and History, 1 (January 1959), 135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Cf. George Eliot, who writes of “… eager men and women to whom the exceptional possession of religious truth was the condition that reconciled them to a meagre existence, and made them feel in secure alliance with the unseen but supreme ruler of a world in which their own visible part was small.”—Felix Holt (London 1866), 42.
22 The literature of separatism in Africa is extremely varied in scope and quality. In addition to Sundkler, see Schlosser, Katesa, Propheten in Afrika (Braunschweig 1949)Google Scholar and Eingeborenenkirchen in Süd und Süd-West Afrika (Kiel 1958); Welbourn, F. B., East African Rebels (London 1961)Google Scholar; Shepperson, George, “Ethiopianism and African Nationalism,” Phylon, XIV (March 1953), 9–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Kenyatta, Jomo, Facing Mount Kenya (London 1961), 269–79.Google Scholar
23 An excellent theoretical discussion is Wilson, Bryan, “An Analysis of Sect Development,” American Sociological Review, XXIV (February 1959), 3–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
24 For some examples, see Rotberg, R. I., “The Lenshina Movement of Northern Rhodesia,” Rhodes-Livingstone Journal, XXIX (June 1961), 63–78.Google Scholar
26 See Buell, Raymond Leslie, The Native Problem in Africa (New York 1928), 11, 601–12.Google Scholar
26 Sundkler, 38ff. See also Theal, G. M., Basutoland Records, 11 (Capetown 1883), 184, 229–31, 241ff.Google Scholar
27 Shepperson, George and Price, Thomas, Independent African (Edinburgh 1958).Google Scholar
28 Ibid., 265–320. Cf. Protectorate, Nyasaland, Report of the Commission Appointed … to Inquire into … the Native Rising within the Nyasaland Protectorate [6819] (Zomba 1916).Google Scholar
29 Rotberg, 76.
30 Russell, Charles Taze, Studies in the Scriptures, 7 vols. (Allegheny, Pa., and Brooklyn, N.Y., 1886–1904).Google Scholar
31 Quoted in Shepperson, George, “The Politics of African Church Separatist Movements in British Central Africa, 1892–1916,” Africa, XXIV (July 1954), 239.Google Scholar
32 Hoffman, Carl Von, Jungle Gods (London 1929), 53.Google Scholar Also Melland, Frank in Glasgow Bulletin, 14 January 1939.Google Scholar
33 The details are contained in ZA 9/2/2/2, Lusaka, and RC 3/9/5/29. Salisbury.
34 See Coleman, James S., “The Emergence of African Political Parties,” in Grove Haines, C., ed., Africa Today (Baltimore 1955), 225–56.Google Scholar
35 Hodgkin, 142.
