Article ID: CBB951503443

Maintaining the local Empire: The Public Works Department in Dar es Salaam, 1920–60 (June 2020)

unapi

Edward, Frank (Author)
Hård, Mikael (Author)


The Journal of Transport History
Volume: 41
Issue: 1
Pages: 27-46


Publication Date: June 2020
Edition Details: Special issue: The Historical Ironies of Roads
Language: English

Historical studies of infrastructures in colonial settings tend to focus on planning, design and construction. The article modifies this bias by highlighting the repair and maintenance of infrastructures. Investigating the Public Works Department in British Tanganyika, the authors illustrate its importance for keeping streets and roads clear, preventing sewage pipes from flooding and keeping electricity lines working. At the same time, the authors show that the Department struggled with a shortage of funds, and that it was often squeezed between other units of the British administration. Despite the obvious importance of repair and maintenance to keep the colonial economy and power apparatus running, such activities did not enjoy high esteem. The authors explain this state of affairs by referring to the generally low status of operation, maintenance and repair in Western culture and to the somewhat uneasy status of the engineering profession in British culture.

...More
Included in

Article De Greiff A. Alexis; Hård Mikael (June 2020) The historical ironies of roads. The Journal of Transport History (pp. 3-5). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB951503443/

Similar Citations

Article Morgan J. Robinson; (2023)
When a Wonder Is Not a Wonder: Swahili, Translation, and the Communication of Knowledge (/isis/citation/CBB737008309/)

Article Sabea, Hanan; (2008)
Mastering the Landscape? Sisal Plantations, Land, and Labor in Tanga Region, 1893--1980s (/isis/citation/CBB001031159/)

Book Emily Brownell; (2020)
Gone to ground : A history of environment and infrastructure in Dar es Salaam (/isis/citation/CBB674765682/)

Article Bradley Fidler; Andrew L. Russell; (October 2018)
Financial and Administrative Infrastructure for the Early Internet Network Maintenance at the Defense Information Systems Agency (/isis/citation/CBB161620234/)

Article Lyubomir Pozharliev; (December 2016)
Collectivity vs. connectivity: Highway peripheralization in former Yugoslavia (1940s–1980s) (/isis/citation/CBB211447072/)

Article Fredrik Bertilsson; (August 2021)
Politics, industry, and tourism: The conceptual construction of the blue highway (/isis/citation/CBB690687008/)

Article Simón Uribe; (June 2020)
The Trampoline of death: Infrastructural violence in Colombia’s Putumayo frontier (/isis/citation/CBB718907690/)

Article Waldemar Kuligowski; (March 2019)
How “Poland Entered Europe”: The Motorway as a Space of Neoliberalism (/isis/citation/CBB588990884/)

Article Giorgio Vittorio Dal Piaz; Alessio Argentieri; (2019)
Sessant’anni del Traforo del Monte Bianco, la storia di un’impresa. Prologo: Da Annibale alle grandi gallerie alpine (/isis/citation/CBB773244504/)

Article Börjeson, Lowe; Hodgson, Dorothy L.; Yanda, Pius Z.; (2008)
Northeast Tanzania's Disappearing Rangelands: Historical Perspectives on Recent Land Use Change (/isis/citation/CBB001031165/)

Book Jeff Schauer; (2019)
Wildlife between Empire and Nation in Twentieth-Century Africa (/isis/citation/CBB609669433/)

Book Joshua Grace; (2021)
African Motors: Technology, Gender, and the History of Development (/isis/citation/CBB668478842/)

Book Ina Heumann; Holger Stoecker; Marco Tamborini; Mareike Vennen; (2018)
Dinosaurierfragmente: Zur Geschichte der Tendaguru-Expedition und ihrer Objekte, 1906-2018 (/isis/citation/CBB168836588/)

Article Dunaway, Finis; (April 2019)
Gallery Editor's Note (/isis/citation/CBB903367667/)

Article Freed, Libbie; (2010)
Networks of (Colonial) Power: Roads in French Central Africa after World War I (/isis/citation/CBB001033654/)

Authors & Contributors
Michal Ďurčo
Waldemar Kuligowski
William W. Buzbee
Pozharliev, Lyubomir
Morgan J. Robinson
Dal Piaz, Giorgio Vittorio
Journals
The Journal of Transport History
International Journal of African Historical Studies
Acque Sotterranee
Transfers
Technology and Culture
Technikgeschichte: Beiträge zur Geschichte der Technik und Industrie
Publishers
VEDA, vydavateľstvo SAV: Historický ústav SAV
Wallstein Verlag
University of Pittsburgh Press
Palgrave Macmillan
Duke University Press
Cornell University Press
Concepts
Colonialism
Infrastructure
Roads and highways
Technology and society
Technology and politics
Germany, colonies
Time Periods
20th century
21st century
19th century
20th century, early
Places
Tanzania (Tanganyika, Zanzibar)
Africa
United States
Italy
Óman
Malawi
Institutions
United States. Defense Communications Agency
Museum für Naturkunde (Berlin)
United States. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment