Proceedings of seminar which brought together individuals from industry, governments, labour, universities and other organizations to share knowledge and views on selected issues in mineral policy.

This book explores the decision of the British Empire to import Chinese labour to southern Africa despite the already tense racial situation in the region. It enables a clearer understanding of racial and political developments in southern Africa during the reconstruction period and places localised issues within a wider historiography.

First published in 1984. Indentured labour migration in the nineteenth century intersects many of the most serious issues of our own time - racism, Third World poverty, and the arrogance of a great world powers. Indenture suggests lack of freedom and the exploitation of people formed into exile or misadventure. Coming as it did after the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1834, in many respects it can be regarded as a replacement of the slave labour system. Indeed, both concerned humanitarians and officials in the nineteenth century, and many historians subsequently have regarded indentured labour merely as 'a new system of slavery'. Many of the articles in this book address themselves to this assertion, whilst investigating the particular variations inherent in their geographic area. The differing patterns of Indian indenture in the West Indies and British Guiana, coming almost immediately after slavery, forms the first section of this book. Attention is given to the Indians engaged in the sugar industries in Mauritius and Fiji, and the rubber industry in Malaya. The use of Pacific Islanders in the Queensland industry is also examined, particularly in the sugar industry which, by the early twentieth century, contained the unique pattern of white, expensive, unionized labour. Other groups dealt with include the aboriginal workers in Australia and the Chinese workers in the Transvaal. Overall, this book is comprehensive and far-reaching in its scope and the complex issues which it raises.

The volumes in this set, originally published between 1968 and 1989, draw together research by leading academics in the area of the British Empire and provides an examination of related key issues. The volumes examine slavery in the British Empire, problems encountered in India in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, as well as the Empire at its most powerful. This set will be of particular interest to students of British, colonial, and world history.

China and Africa have long shared a history of allegiance and contact points through global political forces from the time of colonialism and the Cold War. With China’s rise as the new superpower, its presence in Africa has expanded, leading to significant economic, geopolitical and cultural shifts. While issues such as trade, aid and development have received much attention, Chinese and African encounters through the lens of the visual arts and material culture is a neglected field. Visualising China in Southern Africa: Biography, Circulation, Transgression is a ground-breaking volume that addresses this deficit through engaging with the work of contemporary African and Chinese artists while analysing broader material production that prefigures the current relationship. The essays are wide-ranging in their analysis of ceramics, photography, painting, etching, sculpture, film, performance, postcards, stamps, installations, political posters, cartoons and architecture. Visualising China in Southern Africa confines its focus to southern Africa, yet even within this region, the context is complex. Ethnicity and nationalism, the lingering influence of Cold War allegiances and colonial configurations all continue to play a role. The various visual cultures discussed in this volume emphasise the commonality of these categories, but also point towards other shared histories that transcend the nation-state category. The collection includes scholarly chapters, photo essays, interviews, and artists’ personal accounts, organised around four themes: material flows, orientations and transgressions, spatial imaginaries, and biographies. The artists, photographers, filmmakers, curators and collectors in this volume include: Stary Mwaba, Hua Jiming, Anawana Haloba, Gerald Machona, Nobukho Nqaba, Marcus Neustetter, Brett Murray, Diane Victor, William Kentridge, Kristin NG-Yang, Kok Nam, Mark Lewis, the Chinese Camera Club of South Africa, Wu Jing, Henion Han and Shengkai Wu.

A History of Overseas Chinese in Africa to 1911 explores early Chinese knowledge of and contacts with Africa through Chinese literature on Africa and current archeological evidence, suggesting Sino-African trade existed as early as the seventh century. Li provides readers with an uncomplicated history of Chinese in Africa, examining their story from multiple perspectives, using approaches and sources found in economic history, social history, international relations, and migration in world history. While Li maintains the first group of Chinese were prisoners brought by the Dutch from Southeast Asia in the seventeenth century, the vast majority of early Chinese in Africa were “free immigrants” and contract labors that established key communities and organizations. It is these early Chinese which laid foundations for and provide important context in interpreting the recent flow of Chinese migrants and capital into various parts of Africa.The book should be of value to African and world historians, sociologists, anthropologists, and students of African and Asian studies.