Slavery, the End of Slavery, and the Intensification of Work in the French Soudan, 1883–1912

2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-72
Author(s):  
Richard Roberts
Keyword(s):  
French Soudan

REPRESENTATION, STRUCTURE AND AGENCY: DIVORCE IN THE FRENCH SOUDAN DURING THE EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURY

1999 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 389-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
RICHARD ROBERTS
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Legal Action ◽  
The Third ◽  
Structure And Agency ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
Representation Structure ◽  
The Subject ◽  
French Soudan ◽  
Domestic Affairs

On 5 October 1905, Baia Bari of Gassin village went before the tribunal de province of Segu seeking a divorce from her husband, Tiemoko Boaré of Koila. Both Baia Bari and Tiemoko Boaré were Muslims. Baia Bari claimed that Tiemoko Boaré had mistreated her and that she was prepared to return the bridewealth. In addition, Baia Bari sought the return of 27,000 cowries she claimed Tiemoko Boaré had taken from her, although she did not present any ‘proof’. Tiemoko Boaré agreed to the divorce but denied having taken the money. The court pronounced the divorce and called for Tiemoko Boaré to recover the bridewealth he and his kin had provided to Baia Bari's kin. The court dismissed Baia Bari's claim for the return of 27,000 cowries, because she had failed to produce evidence of the alleged ‘loan’. Neither Baia Bari nor Tiemoko Boaré appealed the court's verdict.How Baia Bari came to bring suit for divorce against her husband for mistreatment and how the provincial court, presided over by the leading African notables of Segu, saw fit to intervene in the domestic affairs of the Boaré household is the subject of this article. The data provided in the ‘Register of Civil and Commercial Judgements Rendered by the Provincial Court of Segu during the Third Quarter of 1905’ are not detailed enough for us to ‘hear’ Baia Bari's complaints about marital mistreatment. Nor does the register tell us anything about how the members of the court understood the evidence of mistreatment, which they accepted, and Baia Bari's claim for the return of 27,000 cowries, which they rejected. Despite the sparse annotation of this case, Baia Bari's legal action raises at least two questions. First, from where did the provincial court ‘receive’ the authority to intervene in the domestic affairs of the Boaré household? Second, why did Baia Bari turn to the provincial court to seek the dissolution of her marriage?

Aoua Keita and the Nascent Women's Movement in the French Soudan

1993 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jane Turrittin
Keyword(s):  
Women's Movement ◽  
French Soudan

Two Worlds of Cotton: Colonialism and the Regional Economy in the French Soudan, 1800-1946

1998 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 473
Author(s):  
Monica M. Van Beusekom ◽  
Richard L. Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Regional Economy ◽  
French Soudan

FETISHIZING RELIGION: ALLAH KOURA AND FRENCH ‘ISLAMIC POLICY’ IN LATE COLONIAL FRENCH SOUDAN (MALI)

2003 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 263-282 ◽  
Author(s):  
GREGORY MANN
Keyword(s):  
Young Men ◽  
Religious Movement ◽  
Religious Practices ◽  
Military Officers ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
Religious Identities ◽  
Conversion To Islam ◽  
French Soudan

This article argues that an innovative religious movement in postwar French Soudan (Mali) led some French administrators and military officers to adopt a new and more open stance towards local religious practices even as they fought hard to limit conversion to Islam and to counteract Muslim reform. Meanwhile, although the founder of the movement advocated submission to local authorities, young men claiming to be his messengers attacked elders and sorcerers. The article suggests that the religious sphere in the Western Sudan was broader than historians have recognized, and that religious identities were particularly important in the troubled transition from subjects to citizens.

The Railways of the French Soudan

1899 ◽  
Vol 47 (1205supp) ◽  
pp. 19318-19319
Keyword(s):  
French Soudan

An early experiment in the reorganisation of agricultural production in the French Soudan (Mali), 1920–40

Africa ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 64 (3) ◽  
pp. 373-390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence C. Becker
Keyword(s):  
Crop Production ◽  
Agricultural Development ◽  
Cropping Systems ◽  
Cropping System ◽  
Early Experiment ◽  
Irrigated Agriculture ◽  
Agricultural System ◽  
Water Control ◽  
Irrigation Project ◽  
French Soudan

Water control has long appeared an attractive technological solution to risky farming i n zones dependent on rain-fed cropping systems, especially in semi-arid regions. From the early twentieth century, European technicians and administrators sought to develop irrigated agriculture in African colonies. In the French Soudan the earliest colonial waterworks date back to the 1920s, just outside Bamako, in the vicinity of Baguineda. From Baguineda the French went on to develop a much larger-scale irrigation project north of Segou known as the Office du Niger. This study uses archival documents to show that a new system of crop production was imposed on peasants by the colonial state. Using labour requisitions and in some cases forced resettlement, the colony introduced new crops and technology for rapid intensification, and in so doing organised a new agricultural system oriented primarily towards the market. The Baguineda project began as, and remained, an enclave, spatially distinct from the surrounding dryland grain and pulse cropping system oriented primarily towards lineage reproduction. In common with many subsequent introduced agricultural development projects in Africa, its lack of success was due in part to the conflicting interests of poor peasant workers and powerful foreign promoters.

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