Portuguese, residents and Sobas in Golungo Alto, Angola: negociation and conflict in military narratives, (c.1840-c.1860)

Author(s)

Felipe Vilas Bôas

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas
• Defense date: 2018-03-09

Examining board members

Lucilene Reginaldo; Maria Cristina Cortez Wissenbach; Elaine Ribeiro da Silva dos Santos

• Advisor: Lucilene Reginaldo

Abstract

Understanding how occured the colonial relations established between Portugueses, moradores and Sobas in the district of Golungo Alto, Angola, observed from colonial narratives of military origen is the central objective of this scientific research. In this perspective, it is sought the capacity of such relations to collaborate in the construction of colonial structures and to reformulate African power between the 1840s and 1860s. The investigation had as privileged source texts of small colonial agents of military career that circulated in the interior of Angola. The period in which this work is focused was known for strong discourses of change political and economic of the activity Portuguese in Angola, inserted in a broader debate about the possibilities of effective occupation of this African territory. In other words, the gradual decadence of trafficking of legal enslaved required a Portuguese action of greater integration in the African territory, which led to the encouragement of agricultural and extractive to purposes activity for commercial export, paving the way for new possibilities of interaction between the Portuguese and communities African traditional mediated by Sobas. The empirical material analyzed testifies to this tendency and allows to verify the inconstancy of the Portuguese colonial actions throughout the nineteenth century and the African participation, either in reaction to the new demands brought by the colonial administration or in its own initiatives aimed at obtaining better gains. The most of the narratives critically analyzed relate to visits, surveys and military campaigns in the backlands of Luanda by colonial officials belonging to the military corps. Therefore, the interests of narration and the perception of the colonial dynamics in such documentation are marked by the sieve of the Portuguese interests. However, even in a document loaded by colonial interests, it was possible to perceive the African agency, especially with regard to commercial action, which allowed Sobas de Mbaka and surrounding regions to play a leading role at various times, from the monopoly on African labor until the attempts to control the movement of goods (AU)