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Research ArticleArticle

Earning an Age

Migration and Maturity in Colonial Kenya, 1895–1952

PAUL OCOBOCK
African Economic History, January 2016, 44 (1) 44-72; DOI: https://doi.org/10.3368/aeh.44.1.44
PAUL OCOBOCK
Paul Ocobock () is an assistant professor of African History at the University of Notre Dame. His forthcoming book, , published with Ohio University Press, examines the power of age and masculinity in the everyday lives of African young men and the crafting of the state in Kenya in the twentieth century.
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Abstract

This article explores the migration of boys and young men from their parents’ homes out onto the coffee, sisal, and tea estates of the settler colony of Kenya. Age and gender figured prominently in their decisions to leave home and work for wages. Young men viewed their physical mobility, financial independence, and distance from elder surveillance as essential to enjoying their youth and rethinking their manliness and coming of age. As they made demands on their elders to acknowledge and ritually authenticate their newfound maturity, they sparked heated debate about and complicated their generational and kinship relations. Age also mattered a great deal to the British colonial state. One of the primary tasks of the state was to ensure the profitability of the settler and multinational firms that produced Kenya’s most important cash crops. With one hand, the state levied its authority, often violently, to draw the young into the wage labor market. With the other, pulled along by social reformers, British officials tried to shield communities from what they believed to be the breakdown of generational, patriarchal authority by legislating underage labor, regulating recruitment, inspecting farms, and fining unscrupulous employers.

  • © 2016 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
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African Economic History: 44 (1)
African Economic History
Vol. 44, Issue 1
1 Jan 2016
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Earning an Age
PAUL OCOBOCK
African Economic History Jan 2016, 44 (1) 44-72; DOI: 10.3368/aeh.44.1.44

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Earning an Age
PAUL OCOBOCK
African Economic History Jan 2016, 44 (1) 44-72; DOI: 10.3368/aeh.44.1.44
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  • Article
    • Abstract
    • Drawing Out the Young, 1895–1933
    • Buying Shukas, Earning an Age, Becoming Men
    • Protecting the Young or the Wartime Economy?
    • Conclusion
    • Footnotes
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