ArchLabour – Architecture, Colonialism and Labour. The role and legacy of mass labour in the design, planning and construction of Public Works in former African territories under Portuguese colonial rule
The discipline of architecture, when dealing with Public Works associated with colonialism and territorial occupation, still focuses on the analysis of the constitution of the design teams, of the colonial Public Works offices, of the architects and engineers themselves.
This focus on the “designing elite” misses a critical input to these Public Works, namely the Labour force responsible for realising these structures. As such, critical questions about the labour force engaged in the spatialization of architectural plans are still missing: who were those workers? What ethnic groups did they come from? How did they emerge in contingents that could aggregate a few thousand individuals? What was their recruitment like? What expectations did they have? How were they paid? What training did they receive? What repercussions did these (mostly compulsive) work experiences have?
What conflicts did they provoke in colonial societies? How did they resist recruitment? How did they collaborate? How to deal with this legacy? In answer, ArchLabour will develop a new theoretical framework for assessing mass labour in order to shine a spotlight on these invisible workers, thus establishing a connection between historical subalternity and the inequality that still haunts communities inheriting this past.
Through the study of the diverse colonial experiences of the African countries that have Portuguese as one of their official languages (Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Principe, Angola and Mozambique), and covering a wide period from the modern colonization that begins after the Berlin Conference through the industrial capitalism’s exploitation praxis up to the years immediately following African independence, the project will cross the history of colonial architecture and the subject of Labour, with the history of Science applied to construction and post-colonial studies in architecture.
ISCTE-IUL
over the Movene river
1942 [PT/AHU/ID-OP/OP01381]
Team
Results
SEMINARS
Colonial and Post-Colonial Landscapes: roundtable series I. Infrastructures + Labour + War, CCB, Lisbon, 9 April 2024
Speakers: Johan Lagae; Peter Scriver; Cristiana Bastos
Launch of the special issue Africana Studia, Vol. 1 N.º 39 (2023): Paisagens Coloniais e Pós- Coloniais: Arquitetura, Cidades e Infraestruturas. https://ojs.letras.up.pt/index.php/AfricanaStudia/index
EXHIBITIONS
“ArchLabour. Architecture, Colonialism and Labour. The role and legacy of mass labour in the design, planning and construction of Public Works in former African territories under Portuguese colonial rule,” Poster, Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) 2024 Conference, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 17-21 April
“The Mabubas Dam’s site: construction and workforce (1948-1954),” Kickstart showcase. Colonial and Post-Colonial Landscapes: roundtable series I. CCB, Lisbon, 9 April 2024
PRESENTATIONS
Ana Vaz Milheiro & Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Building from colonial non-simultaneities: Mabubas Dam, Angola,” Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) 2024 Conference, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 18 April
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Colonial labour housing: a ‘propaganda’ tool?,” European Architectural History Network (EAHN) 2024 Conference, Athens, 20 June
Inês Lima Rodrigues & Francesca Vita (2024), “Large construction companies in the widespread of modern housing. A comparative analysis between Lisbon and Luanda,” 8th International Congress on Construction History (ICCH), Zurich, 24 June
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “’Model’ workers’ villages? Company rule and adobe-brick houses in late colonial Africa,” 8th International Congress on Construction History (ICCH), Zurich, 27 June
Ana Vaz Milheiro (2024), “Women, colonialism and construction sites. Gendered experiences in the former African territories ruled by the Portuguese through the colonial archives,” 8th International Congress on Construction History (ICCH), Zurich, 27 June
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Imperial companies and railways between Angola and Belgian Congo, 1910-1930,” T2M Annual Conference Mobilities and Infrastructures: Transitions and Transformations, Leipzig, 25 September
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Workers’ neighbourhoods, welfare and architecture in late colonial Angola,” Swiss Researching Days Africa, Berna, 26 October
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Building Corporative Empires: A Trans-imperial Genealogy of Recreational and Social Centres across Portugal, Angola and Belgian Congo, 1930s-1960s,” The Architecture of Need: Collective-Use Facilities and Community Service in the Twentieth Century, Lisbon and Évora, 29 October
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “Building Empire: Everyday Architecture of a Mining Concession in Colonial Angola,” Lecture, University of Géneve (consultant Alexander Keese), Geneva, 19 November
PUBLICATIONS
Ana Vaz Milheiro (2024), “Wartime Residential Rural Landscapes the Guinea-Bissau Case during the Colonial/Liberation War with the Portuguese (1963–1974),” Cogent Arts & Humanities 11, no. 1;
Ana Vaz Milheiro (2024), “Women, colonialism and construction sites. Gendered experiences in the former African territories ruled by the Portuguese through the colonial archives,” Construction Matters, 8th ICCH Proceedings, Stefan Holzer, Silke Langenberg, Clemens Knobling, Orkun Kasap (Eds.), VdF / Verlag, 1239-1244;
Beatriz Serrazina (2024), “’Model’ workers’ villages? Company rule and adobe-brick houses in late colonial Africa,”Construction Matters, 8th ICCH Proceedings, Stefan Holzer, Silke Langenberg, Clemens Knobling, Orkun Kasap (Eds.), VdF / Verlag, 1216-1222;
Inês Lima Rodrigues & Francesca Vita (2024), “Large construction companies in the widespread of modern housing. A comparative analysis between Lisbon and Luanda,” Construction Matters, 8th ICCH Proceedings, Stefan Holzer, Silke Langenberg, Clemens Knobling, Orkun Kasap (Eds.), VdF / Verlag, 439-446.
MISSIONS
Angola (Luanda; Housing; Mabubas Dam; Lubango; Matala), 24-31 August 2024. Ana Vaz Milheiro and Filipa Fiúza
CONFERENCE SESSIONS
Ana Vaz Milheiro and Francesca Vita (2025, forthcoming), “Colonial Public Works: Architecture Beyond Labor Subalternity,” Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) 2024, Atlanta, 30 April – 4 May;
Ana Vaz Milheiro and Beatriz Serrazina (2025, forthcoming), “Colonial Building Sites: Labour, Skills and Construction Technologies,” IASTE 2025, Alexandria, 23-26 May;
