Periodic Reporting for period 1 - WomatWork (Women at work: for a comparative history of African female urban professions (Soudn, Tanzania and Ghana), 1919-1970)
Période du rapport: 2023-01-01 au 2025-06-30
WomAtWork represents the first comparative investigation into the history of female urban popular professions in five African countries – Ghana/Gold Coast, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanganyika/Tanzania – over the course of fifty years (1919-1970). Not only is this topic under-studied in African history, but these professions (i.e. midwives, beauticians, wedding singers, market vendors, craftswomen) are also characterized by fascinating and unsettling aspects. For example, notions such as a set price for a certain service and fixed working times or workplace did not apply to many of them.
WomAtWork aims first to discover the peculiarities of these patterns of work and to see their historical transformations as a result of political and economic changes and the introduction of new technologies and commodities. Secondly, it aims to examine professional subjectivities, work ethos, norms and values of women at work. Finally, it questions the relationship between these professionals and their communities – including in the light of the social stigma sometimes attached to them – as well as the nexus between these labourers and political protest, charting when and why they laid down their tools for or against a certain political project.
Based on an innovative methodology, this project seeks to overcome the invisibility of women in official archives by weaving together different threads of sources. It begins inside the photographic archives, in particular those connected with institutions that had conscious agendas of representation and routines of intense textual production (for example, missionary stations, health institutions, and so on). In some cases, these visual sources crossed with textual archives lead to networks or families of women professionals, whose oral history will be solicited. Third, the project aims to analyse the vernacular press combined read at the light of oral accounts.
Through these objectives and methodologies, WomAtWork will participate in the mission of writing a more democratic, inclusive history that firmly establishes the centrality of women's labour in African history.
WomAtWork aims first to discover the peculiarities of these patterns of work and to see their historical transformations as a result of political and economic changes and the introduction of new technologies and commodities. Secondly, it aims to examine professional subjectivities, work ethos, norms and values of women at work. Finally, it questions the relationship between these professionals and their communities – including in the light of the social stigma sometimes attached to them – as well as the nexus between these labourers and political protest, charting when and why they laid down their tools for or against a certain political project.
Based on an innovative methodology, this project seeks to overcome the invisibility of women in official archives by weaving together different threads of sources. It begins inside the photographic archives, in particular those connected with institutions that had conscious agendas of representation and routines of intense textual production (for example, missionary stations, health institutions, and so on). In some cases, these visual sources crossed with textual archives lead to networks or families of women professionals, whose oral history will be solicited. Third, the project aims to analyse the vernacular press combined read at the light of oral accounts.
Through these objectives and methodologies, WomAtWork will participate in the mission of writing a more democratic, inclusive history that firmly establishes the centrality of women's labour in African history.
Although the project started at the beginning of 2023, it has actually been running since 1 January 2024.
Three PhD students have been hired so far (one from Ghana, one from Tanzania and one from Ethiopia; two from the African continent and one from Europe; two hired in January 2023 and one in November 2024) and a fourth is to be hired to work on a Kenyan case study. A post-doc has been recruited for four years to work on the Ghana case study.
The project began with a three-day international kick-off conference entitled "Creative Methodologies: Writing the stories of working women from popular classes in African urban milieus, 1920-1970', which took place in January 2024. The conference included presentations by some members of the project advisory board, all junior and senior project staff, and leading international scholars specialising in innovative approaches to African history (photography, literary studies, oral history, etc.). Another international workshop specifically on photography as a tool for oral history will follow in May 2024.
In July 2024, the whole team (PhD students, post-docs and senior staff) visited relevant European archives together, most of them based in the UK. Some of the archives visited (not exhaustive) are: The National Archives, London, the British Library, the SOAS Archives, the Archives and Library of the London School of Economics, Cambridge University Library, the Bodleian Libraries of Oxford University, the Archives of the Church Missionary Society in Birmingham, the Sudan Archive of Durham University; and in Europe: the Archives of the Social History Institute in Amsterdam, the ILO Archive in Geneva and the White Fathers Archive in Rome. Finally, as planned, the first two PhD students left in September 2024 for their own fieldwork, where they will stay for a year, and the post-doctoral researcher went to Ghana in February 2025 for two months; the three are collecting oral histories and visiting national archives.
The other senior staff (those working on the 20% of the project) are planning to travel later. As for me, having had to cancel my year-long fieldwork in Khartoum due to the war, I am now concentrating on photographic and textual archival material before traveling to Cairo in late 2025 to meet with the Sudanese diaspora there.
In short, a very large amount of oral, textual and photographic data is being collected by the project staff, with thousands of pages copied and dozens of hours of interviews recorded. With the exception of an initial one-year delay and the delay in hiring the third and fourth Ph.D. students for reasons beyond our control, the project is on schedule and meeting its goals.
With regard to the other actions described in the DoA that we were able to implement, in October 2024 we held our first ERC Summer School, which aimed to train students in the methodology and historiography of labour and women's history in Africa. It took place in Addis Ababa at the French Centre for Ethiopian Studies (CFEE). The project included a scholarship and tuition for 10 African students, mostly women, from 6 different African countries (Ghana, Sudan, Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa), selected on the basis of a project proposal, while the teaching staff included African historians along with all the senior staff of the project. This first summer school was a test that will allow us to build better and more efficient summer schools in the coming years.
Finally, the fourth and last scholarly activity described in the project has been the support and promotion of researchers on the continent working on issues related to the project. This has been realised through a system of visiting fellowships for writing retreats in Paris, at the IMAF, from the winter of 2024. So far, three scholars have been invited to IMAF with WomatWork funding: Prof. Salvatory Nyanto, University of Dar es Salaam; Eliud Biegon, Kenyatta University and Nathaniel Chimhete, University of Zimbabwe. The action was very successful and the researchers developed draft articles on the history of working women in their respective countries and received feedback from ERC staff. Publication of their research will be the next step.
Three PhD students have been hired so far (one from Ghana, one from Tanzania and one from Ethiopia; two from the African continent and one from Europe; two hired in January 2023 and one in November 2024) and a fourth is to be hired to work on a Kenyan case study. A post-doc has been recruited for four years to work on the Ghana case study.
The project began with a three-day international kick-off conference entitled "Creative Methodologies: Writing the stories of working women from popular classes in African urban milieus, 1920-1970', which took place in January 2024. The conference included presentations by some members of the project advisory board, all junior and senior project staff, and leading international scholars specialising in innovative approaches to African history (photography, literary studies, oral history, etc.). Another international workshop specifically on photography as a tool for oral history will follow in May 2024.
In July 2024, the whole team (PhD students, post-docs and senior staff) visited relevant European archives together, most of them based in the UK. Some of the archives visited (not exhaustive) are: The National Archives, London, the British Library, the SOAS Archives, the Archives and Library of the London School of Economics, Cambridge University Library, the Bodleian Libraries of Oxford University, the Archives of the Church Missionary Society in Birmingham, the Sudan Archive of Durham University; and in Europe: the Archives of the Social History Institute in Amsterdam, the ILO Archive in Geneva and the White Fathers Archive in Rome. Finally, as planned, the first two PhD students left in September 2024 for their own fieldwork, where they will stay for a year, and the post-doctoral researcher went to Ghana in February 2025 for two months; the three are collecting oral histories and visiting national archives.
The other senior staff (those working on the 20% of the project) are planning to travel later. As for me, having had to cancel my year-long fieldwork in Khartoum due to the war, I am now concentrating on photographic and textual archival material before traveling to Cairo in late 2025 to meet with the Sudanese diaspora there.
In short, a very large amount of oral, textual and photographic data is being collected by the project staff, with thousands of pages copied and dozens of hours of interviews recorded. With the exception of an initial one-year delay and the delay in hiring the third and fourth Ph.D. students for reasons beyond our control, the project is on schedule and meeting its goals.
With regard to the other actions described in the DoA that we were able to implement, in October 2024 we held our first ERC Summer School, which aimed to train students in the methodology and historiography of labour and women's history in Africa. It took place in Addis Ababa at the French Centre for Ethiopian Studies (CFEE). The project included a scholarship and tuition for 10 African students, mostly women, from 6 different African countries (Ghana, Sudan, Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa), selected on the basis of a project proposal, while the teaching staff included African historians along with all the senior staff of the project. This first summer school was a test that will allow us to build better and more efficient summer schools in the coming years.
Finally, the fourth and last scholarly activity described in the project has been the support and promotion of researchers on the continent working on issues related to the project. This has been realised through a system of visiting fellowships for writing retreats in Paris, at the IMAF, from the winter of 2024. So far, three scholars have been invited to IMAF with WomatWork funding: Prof. Salvatory Nyanto, University of Dar es Salaam; Eliud Biegon, Kenyatta University and Nathaniel Chimhete, University of Zimbabwe. The action was very successful and the researchers developed draft articles on the history of working women in their respective countries and received feedback from ERC staff. Publication of their research will be the next step.
It is too early to draw conclusions from the project, but it is clear that all the research undertaken so far is opening up new and unexplored avenues in the history of working women, from the history of seamstresses and tailors in southern Ghana, to the history of market women in northern Ghana, to the history of potters in Ethiopia, and finally to the origins of female labour in Sudan (the most advanced projects to date).
Perhaps the most encouraging point is that the preliminary results tend to confirm some of the hypotheses described in the project proposal: the widespread presence of urban popular professionals in early phases of colonial history, the importance of photography and oral accounts as sources for writing their history. These methodological issues are particularly important because, beyond the specific case studies, they may offer powerful tools to overcome the intractable problem of the lack of textual sources, as the histories of women workers are systematically outside the gaze of colonial and postcolonial states. I believe this can open the way for more research in this area.
Perhaps the most encouraging point is that the preliminary results tend to confirm some of the hypotheses described in the project proposal: the widespread presence of urban popular professionals in early phases of colonial history, the importance of photography and oral accounts as sources for writing their history. These methodological issues are particularly important because, beyond the specific case studies, they may offer powerful tools to overcome the intractable problem of the lack of textual sources, as the histories of women workers are systematically outside the gaze of colonial and postcolonial states. I believe this can open the way for more research in this area.