UWCScholar :: Browsing by Author "Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma"

Browsing by Author "Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma"

Now showing 1 - 12 of 12

Betwixt the oceans: The Chief Immigration Officer in Cape Town, Clarence Wilfred Cousins (1905�1915)
(Taylor & Francis, 2016) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
Drawing on the personal and official papers of an immigration officer, this article highlights his personality, social life, and the quotidian aspects of his work at the port. By placing the officer at the centre, instead of the usual tendency in South African historiography to focus on ethnic immigration histories, one secures broader insights into the administration of policy, such as the writing test (an exclusionary mechanism) and repatriation, which are often associated with state policies against Indians. While the article draws on examples of arrivals at the port from both the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, arguing against a focus on only Indian Ocean traffic, it emphasises how arrivals from India played a role in shaping the immigration bureaucracy. While scholars have recently begun to see Cape Town as an important Indian Ocean port, this article points to settler society�s unease with what sea traffic from Bombay and Durban might bring and how Cape Town sought to establish a disconnect with the East.
Cape Indians, Apartheid and Higher Education
(University of the Western Cape, 2013) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
On a Sunday afternoon, 15 November 2009, the Luxurama Theatre in Wynberg was filled to capacity as Indians in Cape Town gathered to launch the Cape Town 1860 Legacy Foundation in preparation for the 2010 events commemorating the 150th anniversary of the arrival of Indians in Natal. The Foundation had been constituted after meetings in Cape Town had been addressed by Satish Dhupelia and AV Mohammed who were members of the 1860 Legacy Foundation of Durban, tasked with co-ordinating a national movement. They and Ashwin Trikamjee, a religious leader who chaired the Durban committee were present. The gathering brought Gujarati Hindus, Christians, Muslims, and Tamil Hindus of the city together. While the ancestors of many of those present had come as immigrants to the Cape directly from India and had little direct connection to indenture, the Tamils present did have their roots in the indenture system. The movement from Natal to the Cape Colony by the ex-indentured had, in fact, begun from the 1870s in response to the discovery of diamonds in Kimberley.1 Many Tamil Indians would continue to come to the Cape in the post-Union period often breaking inter-provincial restrictions on movement and settling in the Cape illegally.
Durban and Cape Town as port cities: Reconsidering Southern African studies from the Indian Ocean
(Taylor & Francis, 2016) Hofmeyr, Isabel; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma; Kaarsholm, Preben
This special issue arose out of a workshop titled �Durban and Cape Town as Indian Ocean Port Cities: Reconsidering Southern African Studies from the Indian Ocean�, held at the University of the Western Cape in September 2014. The volume is located at the intersection of southern African studies and Indian Ocean studies, and explores this exchange as a site for enriching southern African transnational historiographies.
False fathers and false sons: Immigration officials in Cape Town, documents and verifying minor sons from India in the first half of the twentieth century
(University of the Western Cape, 2014) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
This article examines the rituals of admission to Cape Town, developed by the immigration bureaucracy at the port, for minor sons from India. It provides a context for why the entry of sons of established Indian residents became an issue. Drawing on local knowledge as well as the official archives, the article takes one into the heart of immigration encounters. Its primary focus is on systems of identification and verification of relationships and ages, the role that documents played, and what this says about state power. It points to a progression from fairly primitive methods employed in the early years to demands for certificates to be completed in India, inter-governmental cooperation, village enquiries in India, and the use of technology such as fingerprinting, photographs and x-rays. Over time the bureaucracy seemingly became more powerful. Yet individuals coming from India, where the documentation of individual identity was not a significant state priority, responded creatively. Paying attention to the documents themselves, this article argues that, despite elaborate paperwork and systems, truths about fathers and sons remained elusive. The article points to how, despite demanding documents from India, officials in Cape Town, with some justification, distrusted these papers. The very documentary systems developed to ensure state control over who would be admitted into the country undermined the state's ability to do precisely that.
Madeirans in Cape Town: Immigration documentation, marriage and settlement, 1900s to the 1970s
(University of the Western Cape, 2019) McEvoy, Michael Desmond; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
This thesis traces the immigration of Madeirans to Cape Town and their settlement from the 1900s to the 1970s. It focuses on how exclusionary legislation from 1902 affected Madeiran entry, how they managed to circumvent it and the documents required for immigration over this long period. Particular attention is drawn to the role of women in the migration process, the nature of the households and the impact of women in shaping a settled Madeiran population. The thesis examines the role Portuguese organisations played and continue to play in maintaining cultural and religious values and the extent to which these values have been retained in the second and later generations. This thesis seeks to ask to what extent the Madeiran migration experience bears commonalities with other groups, particularly Indians, or whether unique features are discernible. Indians and Madeirans were both regarded as �undesirable� and subject to literacy tests, domicile certificates, permits and certificates of identity. Illegal entry was common to both groups. Chain migration featured in their decision to leave the poverty of their homeland. The split-household was the dominant household form. Once settled, Indian and Madeiran wives played a key role in the business and in passing on their cultural and religious values. Both groups established cultural organisations. Despite these commonalities, Madeiran migration displayed certain unique features compared to Indians.
Paper regimes
(University of the Western Cape, 2014) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
In 1915 Baba Bapoo, a store assistant in Cape Town, was thrown into a state of great mental and emotional stress when he lost his permit en route to India. This was the only document that could guarantee his re-admission to South Africa. He wrote to a friend to apply for a replacement indicating, 'Since I have made the lost [sic] my heart has turned into madness'. He managed to secure a fresh permit as his application was on record in the Cape Town Immigration Department. Osman Vazir was less fortunate he left for India rather suddenly, in the process omitting to secure a permit. Later, he wrote an impassioned plea from India to the Immigration Department in Cape Town citing all the documents in his possession which proved he had been in South Africa: 'I have got a register of Transvaal, a pass of Free State, a certificate from Gas Co., a receipt for a pass which was received by me in 1907, a card from Somerset Hospital...' He, however, did not have the right paper needed to re-enter Cape Town. His plea to be allowed in 'with both hands joined, as one to the Almighty and a father' was in vain. In the late 1930s, Walter Sisulu was arrested and taken to the Hillbrow police station in Johannesburg because there was 'something wrong with my pass book'. After paying a fine he was released. The position of African males in South Africa's urban spaces was aptly summed up by a migrant labourer in Peter Abrahams' novel: 'Man's life is controlled by pieces of paper'.
Re-locating memories: transnational and local narratives of Indian South Africans in Cape Town
(SAGE Publications, 2017) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
This article plays on the word re-location to examine the memories of Indians in South Africa through oral histories about relocation as a result of the Group Areas Act, to memories of parents and grandparents relocating to South Africa from India as told to interviewees and to their own memories of journeys to India and back. The narratives of mobilities traverse time and national boundaries and are counter-posed by narratives of local mobilities as well as stasis. The article identifies ways of narrating, themes of narration and the meaning of memories while noting the re-location of memory construction against the backdrop of South Africa�s democratic transition and the 150th commemoration of the arrival of indentured Indians to South Africa. It argues that the local and the national are important in narrations of transnational journeys, thus advancing a particular approach to transnational memory studies.
Speaking about building Rylands (1960s to 1980s): a Cape Flats history
(Taylor and Francis, 2014) Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
This article draws on oral histories of Rylands, a former Indian group area on the Cape Flats. It shifts focus from narratives of dispossession to narratives of the making of a relocation site. The Cape Flats has generally been represented as a place of poverty, crime and hopelessness and existing on the 'fringe' of the city. This article seeks to complicate our understandings and imaginings of the Cape Flats by focusing on Rylands. In its focus on the middle class, it argues that they transformed their physical surroundings. Spaces in Rylands, built by Indian capital, also offered the Cape Flats useful resources. As an apartheid-designated space, Rylands had a significant role in the entrenching of Indianness leading to energised cultural and religious activity with temples and mosques becoming the centre for residents. There were competing visions for Rylands; some dallied with apartheid governance structures but, by the 1980s, the nonracial ethos dominated and for youth this place became their centre.
Street trading in the central business district of Cape Town 1864- 2012: a study of state policies
(University of the Western Cape, 2014) Tabe, Fidelis Ebot; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
This thesis seeks to examine the making of official policies on street trading in Cape Town�s city centre and the impact of such policies. It covers an extensive period from colonial times to the Union era and from apartheid to democracy. The local government and its role in controlling the trade is the centre of focus but the thesis also explores how the oral testimonies of street traders in the city centre contribute to our understanding of the activity as well as the impact of policy. This thesis poses several questions. What influences policy? What is the impact of policy? Are there continuities or discontinuities in policy? How does one understand street trading and the impact of policy from the perspectives of street traders themselves? Given that there are significant studies of street trading in other municipalities, how does a history of street trading in Cape Town compare? Is there anything distinctive about Cape Town?` Several factors have influenced policy. These have been similar to other local authorities. These have been the desire to raise revenue for the city, to protect the interest of established businesses who feared competition from street traders, the city�s desire to maintain a clean, beautiful and orderly city, as well as traffic and sanitation considerations. Like other local authorities, strategies have included: issuing licenses to street traders and the development and implementation of street trading regulations which either restricted or prohibited street trading. In contrast to studies of other cities, this thesis explores the practice of registration as a measure of control which nonetheless confers rights. This thesis marks the 1980s as representing a decisive shift in policy from one characterized by the prosecution of street traders to a more sympathetic and supportive approach towards street traders. The post-apartheid context saw significant changes in policy motivated by the desire to seek solutions to unemployment and poverty alleviation. Thus permanent stands for street traders in the city centre have been provided, traders have been involved in decision making and power has been devolved to associations. The latter practice has been significant in Cape Town. This thesis has also found that out of the major South African cities, Cape Town comes after Johannesburg in having progressive street trader policies. This measure of progressive is seen in the number of street traders, in the provision of infrastructure such as stands and the encouragement of the sector. While the Cape Town city council has a developmental continuum plan which sees street trading leading to formal businesses, it has yet to put resources to further this. Oral histories have been particularly useful in highlighting that street trading is not only the occupation of the urban poor. This thesis highlights individuals with skills and education and who see the sector as bearing many advantages. The thesis points to the sector as being differentiated. Further, the distinction between the formal and informal gets blurred in the contemporary era. This thesis highlights the hereditary nature of street trading in Cape Town thus challenging ideas of street trading as a transitory occupation. With regard to policy, interviews highlighted the negative impact of policy during apartheid. While traders see the advantages of the democratic era, they nonetheless argue too that the encouragement of the sector has seen an increase in the number of street traders but no significant increase in a customer base. There is thus some nostalgia for the pre-1994 years. This study has allowed one to track continuity and discontinuity and to explore the idea of a progressive policy and to make comparisons with other cities drawing from official and oral sources.
Then and Now: Activism in Manenberg, 1980 to 2010
(University of the Western Cape, 2010) Jacobs, Julian A; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma; Dept. of History; Faculty of Arts
The study analysed the politics of resistance in Manenberg placing it within the over arching mass defiance campaign in Greater Cape Town at the time and comparing the strategies used to mobilize residents in Manenberg in the 1980s to strategies used in the period of the 2000s. The thesis also focused on several key figures in Manenberg with a view to understanding what local conditions inspired them to activism. The use of biographies brought about a synoptic view into activists lives, their living conditions, their experiences of the apartheid regime, their brutal experience of apartheid and their resistance and strength against a system that was prepared to keep people on the outside. This study found that local living conditions motivated activism and became grounds for mobilising residents to make Manenberg a site of resistance. It was easy to mobilise residents on issues around rent increases, lack of resources, infrastructure and proper housing.
Unfinished lives: The biographies of Nokuthula Simelane
(University of the Western Cape, 2018) Abrahams, Brent Nicholas; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma; Moosage, Riedwaan
Nokuthula Simelane, born near Bethal in Mpumalanga, joined the ANC's armed-wing uMKhonto we Sizwe (MK) as a courier while studying at the University of Swaziland in the early 1980s. In 1983 she set out on a mission to South Africa on the pretext of purchasing clothing for her up-coming graduation. Simelane was however abducted, and has since not been heard from nor has her body been found. Her disappearance was one of those examined by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of South Africa. These are some facts about Simelane. This thesis seeks to explore how Simelane's biographies manifest themselves across multiple genres and in so doing determine their similarities and differences, with a view to understanding the difficulties of producing the biography of a missing person. The genres of biography I examine relation to Simelane are: the TRC's Amnesty Committee (AC) hearings, the Human Rights Violations Committee (HRVC) hearing, their transcripts and the TRC reports; a documentary film called Betrayal directed by Mark Kaplan; and a statue of Simelane located in Bethal sculpted by Ruhan Janse van Vuuren.
West Africans in Cape Town: Immigration and struggles over documentation, 1994-2016
(University of the Western Cape, 2016) Ambe, Nforh Anthony; Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma
International migration has been a growing phenomenon in the West African community from the late 1960s as the colonial period came to an end and most West African countries gained their independence. During this period this migration trend was essentially from West Africa to Europe facilitated by the relationship that existed between West African states and their former colonial master. In the 1990s Western countries started restricting immigration by applying stricter immigration laws. West Africans who could not make it to the West sought alternative destinations like South Africa where the apartheid regime had just come to an end and the first elected democratic government had been installed in 1994. West Africans in South Africa are mostly economic immigrants and as South Africa's immigration policies changed this group of people faced challenges to acquire the documents required to legalize their stay in the country. This study seeks to analyze why West Africans chose to immigrate to South Africa and specifically Cape Town, their struggle for documentation and the extent to which the possession or non-possession of the correct documents affected their lives in Cape Town. It drew on interviews with Nine West Africans to try and understand this.The study found out that the main reason for West African immigration to South Africa after 1994 was because of the fall of the apartheid regime and the coming to power of the ANC government which re-established diplomatic and economic relations with most West African states. Countries in the West African region were faced with crisis in the 1980s as a result of policies that were implemented in the pursuit to address the ills of colonialism. As the economies of most of these countries declined, most West Africans were faced poverty and became desperate. In their quest for a better live West Africans embarked on immigrating to more developed and affluent countries. Initially they were immigrating to the countries of their colonial masters but with time as more people were immigrating, other destinations in Europe and North America became sought after. Restrictive immigration policies in these countries forced West African to look for new destinations to go to. They found that in South Africa after 1994. Apart from the economic crisis in the West African region, poor governance, corruption, political suppression and tribalism served as push factors in contributing to the immigration of West Africans to South Africa. As pull factors, the reliance on kinship played an important part in most West Africans who immigrated to South Africa. Many of them relied on the friends and family who were resided in South Africa for information, directions and support to make the journey and eventually join them were they are based. The picture and information that the mass media projected about South Africa also had a huge impact on the perception people had about the country. These perceptions contributed to the decision of West Africans to immigrate to South Africa. This study explored the range of visas West Africans sought to enter the country. It found that the visa they chose to apply for was not necessarily the real purpose of their visit but was the most convenient. This allowed them entry into the country and once in they sought other visas and permits to legalise their stay. This study found that it was a long hard journey to convert asylum permits to refugee permits Further the struggle over documentation was mainly because of the logistical short comings of the Department of Home Affairs. This study argues that it is the Department of Home Affairs that renders many of them illegal due to delays in processing the permits. .While they waited for documents, the lives of applicants were full of insecurity and there were difficulties in making a living. The informal sector provided one avenue for some. This thesis argues that applicants were desperate for the correct documents but even though they eventually acquired them these did not necessarily open up opportunities.

Browsing by Author "Dhupelia-Mesthrie, Uma"

Results Per Page

Sort Options