Painting between the lines: the Cape Verdean community of Colonial Dakar, 1920–1945

Abstract

From the late nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth century, Cape Verdean immigrants to Dakar, colonial capital of French West Africa, became a small but important community in terms of significance in both the urban economy and the colonial framework of race and identity. They occupied important labor niches valuable to the colonizer such as painting and domestic work and attached those fields to a unique identity to which only they belonged. Able to capitalize on the ambiguity inherent to colonial race and identity policies, Cape Verdeans bridged categories common to state policies – particularly “foreign” and “native” – in ways not adequately captured by the concept of intermediaries often employed in examinations of immigrant populations to West Africa. Their insertion in Dakar reveals the permeability of such colonial concepts as well as the opportunities immigrants made in town.

Résumé

De la fin du XIX^e siècle au milieu du XX^e siècle, les immigrants du Cap-Vert à Dakar, la capitale coloniale de l’Afrique de l’Ouest française, sont devenus une communauté petite mais importante sur le plan de sa place tant au sein de l’économie urbaine que dans le cadre colonial de la race et de l’identité. Ils occupaient d’importants créneaux sur le marché de l’emploi précieux pour les colonisateurs, comme la peinture et le travail domestique, et reliaient ces secteurs à une identité unique à laquelle ils étaient les seuls à appartenir. Les Cap-verdiens, capables d’exploiter l’ambiguïté inhérente aux dimensions politiques coloniales de la race et de l’identité, reliaient des catégories communes aux politiques publiques, notamment « étranger » et « autochtone », ce de manières que le concept d’intermédiaires souvent employé dans les examens des populations immigrantes en Afrique de l’Ouest n’exprime pas pleinement. Leur insertion à Dakar révèle la perméabilité de ces concepts coloniaux, ainsi que les opportunités qu’ont créées ces immigrants dans la ville.

Keywords:

• Cape Verdeans
• Dakar
• immigrants
• work
• identity

Mots clés:

• Cap-verdiens
• Dakar
• immigrants
• travail
• identité

Notes

1. While many works on urbanization in Africa have explored the concept of migrants, permanent town dwellers and the spaces in between, Parker’s work on the Ga in Accra most clearly addresses the question of autochthons. See Parker (2000).

2. All archival research was carried out in the Archives Nationales du Sénégal (ANS), hereafter referred to in notes as ANS. Interviews were conducted by the author in Dakar in French.

3. Direction des Affaires Politiques et Administratives, Note AP/2 “Development of large cities in AOF, Draft,” 7 June 1934, ANS 21G/49.

4. Guyer points out that economic niches in Africa are inherently productive, functioning to permit people to make a living.

5. Letter from the governor-general of FWA to the administrator of the Circumscription of Dakar, 9 March 1935, ANS K161(26).

6. Confidential Note No. 1222, Service of Political Affairs, 4 September 1945, ANS K108(26).

7. Commune de Gorée, Salaires municipaux, 1889–1894, ANS 3G2/93.

8. Dakar Census, 1875, 3G2/127.

9. Population statistics, Gorée, 1908, ANS 3G2/135. Of 1387 listed, 135 were noted as foreigners.

10. Interview, Jose Da Silva, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, June 2012. Also, Nelson Eurico Cabral, “Les Migrations aux Iles de Cap-Vert.”

11. Dakar et Dépendances, Rapport Politique, 1935, ANS 2G35/11.

12. See files ANS 5 M/210(184), 5 M/211(184), and 5 M/218(184) for the years in question.

13. Interview, Jose Da Silva, June 2012; interview, Jeanne Rodrigues, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, June 2012; interview, Rosa Maria Delgado, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, June 2012; interview, Camilla Guillerme, née Gomez, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, July 2012; interview, Anna-Maria Gonzaga-Silva, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, June 2012.

14. Dakar remained under 10,000 inhabitants throughout the nineteenth century, surpassing Saint-Louis in population only after the onset of major expansion projects begun in the later 1910s and early 1920s.

15. Interview with Jean-Paul Dias, September 2007, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, Senegal. Interview with Antoine Dos Reis, September 2007, Sacre-Coeur III, Dakar, Senegal.

16. Interview with Oumar Ba, September 2007, Dakar, Senegal. Such immigrants could be from the regions of Senegal, West Africa, and further afield. Ba asserts that the early arrivals from the Futa Toro, for instance, entered easily into administration jobs because Lebu Dakarois originally did not want them. Peil makes this kind of argument about the availability of jobs to African migrants to cities in situations in which autochthons eschew certain roles (1981), 272–274).

17. Letter from Adjoint des A.J. Aumont, Magasin du Ravitaillement, to Chef du Services des Affaires Economiques, 19 February 1919, ANS K399(132).

18. Sénégal, Territoires d’administration directe: Rapport d’ensemble, 4e trimestre, 1917: Dakar, Gorée, Rufisque et Banlieue de Dakar, December 1917, ANS 2G17/26.

19. See also, interview, Jose Da Silva, June 2012; interview, Bartholemy Guillerme, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, July 2012; interview, Joe Lopes, Sicap-Baobab, Dakar, June 2012.

20. Letter from the administrator of the circumscription of Dakar to the governor-general, No. 148AG, 15 April 1939, ANS K142(26).

21. Letter from the governor-general of FWA to the administrator of the Circumscription of Dakar, No. 175 SE/9, 6 November 1934, ANS K161(26).

22. Ibid.

23. Letter from the administrator of the Circumscription of Dakar to the governor-general of FWA, No. 47/AG, 7 December 1934, ANS K161(26).

24. Ibid.

25. Letter from the governor-general of FWA to the administrator of the Circumscription of Dakar, 9 March 1935, ANS K161(26).

26. Interview, Jose Da Silva, June 2012; interview, Bartholemy Guillerme, July 2012; interview, Joe Lopes, June 2012.

27. For instance, ANS 5 M/211(184), ANS 5 M/218(184), ANS 5 M/230(184), ANS 5 M/231(184), ANS 5 M/233(184), and ANS 5 M/259(184). These dossiers contain a number of references to masons and painters of Cape Verdean origin.

28. Confidential letter from the governor-general of FWA to the secretary-general of the governor-general, lieutenant-generals, and the administrator of Dakar, 11 August 1932, ANS K142(26).

29. Note from the director of Finance to the director of Political and Administrative Affairs, on “Employment of Foreigners,” 3 May 1939, ANS 142(26).

30. Letter from the administrator of Dakar to the governor-general of FWA, No. 148/AG, 15 April 1939, ANS K142(26).

31. “L’AOF, colonie syrienne: Comment opère un commerçant syrien,” in Le Courrier Colonial, 14 January 1938, ANS 1Q322(77).

32. Letter No. 47AG in response to Circular No. 432 SE/9, 7 December 1934, K161(26).

33. Foreign labor, lists submitted to the state, 193, K257(26).

34. Ibid.

35. This idea also emerges clearly in the statements that appear in certain cases involving Cape Verdeans in the Tribunal de Première Instance de Dakar. In a 1932 record, one Cape Verdean complainant asked for state intervention in a family matter, citing his Catholicism as evidence of his commitment to marriage and contrasting it with what he asserted was the Muslim preference for divorce; 5 M/224(184).

36. For instance, ANS 5 M/205(184), ANS 5 M/211(184), ANS 5 M/218(184), ANS 5 M/230(184), ANS 5 M/231(184), ANS 5 M/233(184), and ANS 5 M/259(184). These dossiers contain a number of references to such jobs as laundresses and housekeepers of Cape Verdean origin.

37. Interview, Rose Maria Delgado, June 2012; interview, Jeanne Rodrigues, June 2012; interview, Camilla Guillerme, July 2012.

38. Interview, Camilla Guillerme, July 2012.

39. Interview, Rose Maria Delgado, June 2012; interview, Camilla Guillerme, July 2012.

40. Many informants implicitly suggested this when speaking, as if to assume there was information known to the researcher and the informant not needing explanation. Others stated it outright in speaking about their work. Interview, Rose Maria Delgado, June 2012; interview, Camilla Guillerme, July 2012.

41. One informant made this view clear by asserting that local work was open to Senegalese, and thus, “if you want to work, you need to be Senegalese”; interview, Jeanne Rodrigues, June 2012.

42. The most valuable comments came from an interview with Rosa Maria Delgado, June 2012, who spoke not only of her husband but also male relatives. All other formal and informal conversations with Cape Verdeans took the barbering trade as a given fact, even when interviewees had not entered the occupation. Researcher inquiries among Senegalese in Dakar’s downtown city center as to where Cape Verdean pockets could be found nearly always led to a small quadrant of streets on which Senegalese said “Cape Verdean barber shops” historically had been located. Another American researcher, discussing the material, noted that in his own inquiries about where to get his own hair cut, he was directed by locals to Cape Verdean barbers because of their ability to cut “European” hair.

43. ANS 5 M/154(184) contains an entry that shows a “Cape Verdean shop” to exist on the corners of Rue Vincens and Rue Victor Hugo, the area to which this researcher was often directed.

44. ANS 5 M/230(184); ANS 5 M/219(184); ANS 5 M/264(184).

45. There are a number of cases of this nature in the 5 M collection. For clear examples, see Semedo v. Lopez, June 15 1943 and Viegas v. Da Silva Vaz, April 22 1943, both in ANS 5 M/265(184).

46. Rebeusse, located just south of Avenue Malick Sy and north of central Dakar and the Sandaga market, is a neighborhood known to have housed Cape Verdeans in the earlier parts of the twentieth century up to the 1960s. Later, a nearby “cité” was developed that might have been linked to Cape Verdean presence. The “cité” was a housing development the state planned in the 1940s and realized by the late 1950s for workers. Whether its name was derived from the heritage of Cape Verdean workers in the area or from Dakar’s Cap-Vert placement is unclear. The Dakarois who submitted official requests for housing there were of all origins. See ANS 4P 2992 – ANS 4P 2997, all on the “Cité Cap-Verdienne” in Dakar. References to the “Cité Cap-Verdienne” in scholarly literature on Dakar are rare and nebulous at best. It appears most commonly in Senegalese-generated work on topics addressing urban spaces and society, but even in those instances it is taken as common knowledge. On its status as an old Dakar neighborhood, see, for example, Abdoulaye Tombon-Biaye, “Les Initiatives des Jeunes dans la Lutte contre la Pauvreté Urbaine à Dakar: Le Cas des Compagnons SIGGI des Points de Dakar-Plateau, Grand-Yoff, Yeumbeul, et Diokoul,” Master’s thesis (Université Gaston Berger de Saint-Louis, 1999), 30. See also the reference in Coquery-Vidrovitch, “Villes Coloniales et Histoire des Africains,” Vigntième Siècle 20 (1988), 49–73.

47. Interview, Joe Lopes, June 2012; interview, Jose Da Silva, June 2012.

48. Interview, Jose Da Silva, June 2012.

49. Ibid.

50. Letter from the governor-general to the administrator of Dakar, 9 March 1935, ANS K161(26); list of “Foreign Businesses in Dakar,” 29 December 1939, K108(26).

51. Interview, Jean-Paul Dias, September 2007; interview, Antoine Dos Reis, September 2007.

52. For example, cases involving Cape Verdeans in ANS 5 M/211(184), ANS 5 M/219(184), ANS 5 M/229(184), and ANS 5 M/233(184).

53. Inspector of Colonies, Report on the Standard of Living of Natives in the Circumscription of Dakar, 4 February 1939, and Response of the Governor-General to the Report of Inspector of Colonies, ANS 4G/107(105).

54. ANS 5 M/154(184); ANS 5 M/155(184); ANS 5 M/157(184). Records in files such as these contain many instances of public drunkenness and altercations between Cape Verdean Dakarois.

55. ANS 5 M/210(184); ANS 5 M/219(184); ANS 5 M/233(184).

56. Numerous police and surveillance reports bear witness to this. For example, see deportation lists from 3 June 1941, ANS K108(26). See, for example, the admonishment of authorities after receiving a case involving a local quarrel in September 1934, ANS 5 M/233(184). See also comments about the Cape Verdean community in Dakar et Dépendences, Annual Political Report 1940, ANS 2G40/1, and in the report five years earlier, Dakar et Dépendences, Political Report 1935, ANS 2G35/11.

57. Dakar et Dépendances, Political Report 1935, ANS 2G35/11.

58. Dakar deportation lists from 3 June 1941, ANS K108(26).

59. Renseignements politiques, Service de Sûreté, September to December 1943, ANS 17G/410.

60. Dakar et Dépendances, Annual Political Report 1940, ANS 2G40/1.

61. Ibid.

62. Note de AP/2: “Détermination d’une politique de développement des grandes villes en AOF, Draft,” 9 June 1934, ANS 21G/49.

63. Dakar et Dépendances, Annual Political Report 1940, ANS 2G40/1.

64. Classified Note from the Chief of Political Affairs to the Director of General Security, 30 June 1945, ANS 17G/109(17).

65. Ibid.