Abstract
In this chapter, the constitution of the retail sector in and around Johannesburg through the labour of white women from the 1930s to the 1970s in service to a “white public” is examined. A gendered and racialized notion of service became central to directing expanding consumption under apartheid. Working-class white women organized into their union to contest poor conditions in stores, but a class identity became harder for them to maintain under apartheid. Their experiences were individualized, and they reproduced social hierarchies within shops while securing these spaces of consumption for their customers.
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Notes
- 1.
Ingrid du Toit, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Benoni, August 21, 2007.
- 2.
See, for example, McClintock (1993, 1995), Hyslop (1995), Hofmeyr (1987), Kruger (1991), du Toit (2003), Brink (1986, 1987, 1990), du Plessis (2010, 2011), Vincent (2000), Boehmer (1992), and Walker (1995). See Hassim (2006) for a discussion of the complex relationship of the women’s movement to nationalism in relation to such tropes in a later period. Tiffany Willoughby-Herard’s (2015) history of the Carnegie Commission and its work tying “global whiteness” to forms of nationalism through governing white poverty and labour is also relevant, as white women were both symbols of what she calls “white vulnerability” and targets of reform (51). For a broader literature linking gender to nation, see Bannerji (2000), Yuval-Davis and Anthias (1989), and Scott (1988).
- 3.
During the first decades of white women’s employment in South Africa, general prejudices and in some sectors legal bars operated against the employment of married women (Berger 1992, 33, 56, 74–75). Partly as a result of wartime labour shortage, in the 1940s shifts in policy opened up the employment of married women (Berger 1992, 142, 178; Marks 1994, 113). But, in some sectors, such as the public service, these bars operated into the 1950s and 1960s (Walker 2001), and the attitude toward white married women working fluctuated: for instance, see Mooney (2006, 91) for a rise of concern over juvenile delinquency in the 1950s which was linked to working mothers.
- 4.
See literature cited in endnote 2, above. That is not to say that white women did not resist this interpellation. Brink (1987), for example, discusses the class identity (“factory meide”) of Afrikaner women garmen t workers in the 1920s and 1930s in relation to the notions of respectable motherhood. During the 1930s and 1940s, these working-class white women made claim to an alternative notion of volksmoeder (mother of the nation) to assert an alternate feminine respectability in worker identity (Brink 1990; Vincent 2000; also Kruger 1991; Berger 1992). I have argued (Kenny 2008) that white women shop workers’ capacity to claim a class identity narrowed substantially with the National Party’s victory in 1948. At issue here is how these service workers in complex ways constituted notions of nation, belonging, and respectability in retail shops.
- 5.
Following Hall (1985, 2000), I contend that subjects are constituted through language, within social relations and through practice in time and place. This precise conjuncture involves a process of articulation which itself “fixes” meaning (Hall 1985, 93) and can only be understood in its “concrete” analysis (Hall 1985, 92). I discuss this conceptualization in more detail in Chap. 1.
- 6.
Janice Tomlinson, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Johannesburg, October 1, 2013.
- 7.
It was licensed from Parker Brothers in 1963 for the South African market.
- 8.
“East Rand Gossip,” The East Rand Express, May 11, 1912, 29. Retailing was initially a male occupation, with shops started by immigrants (Gill 1957; Kaplan 1986). See Swaisland (1993, 61–62) for the lack of appeal of retail jobs to British immigrant women in the early twentieth century. On professional male merchants in other contexts, see Humphrey (1998, 57), Bowlby (2001), and Benson (1986).
- 9.
- 10.
- 11.
Pauline Schmidt, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Johannesburg, March 6, 2007.
- 12.
It should be noted that in this period small Afrikaner traders secured the exclusion of Indian merchants from white areas through the Group Areas Act o f 1950 (see O’Meara 1983, 213–18; for the Group Areas Act, see Mabin 1992). South Africa did not use anti-trust legislation to promote competition, as in the United States, where an effect was to divide the national market through regional firms (Wrigley and Lowe 2002; Levinson 2011). Until 1967, the South African state supported Resale Price Maintenance, which legislated price controls on certain items, with the effect of balancing large producers, wholesalers, and retailers. The Regulation of Monopolistic Conditions Act, No. 24 of 1955, prohibited forms of uncompetitive behaviour that were seen to contribute to soaring consumer prices. The first investigation under this act was the grocery trade, and in 1958 the Minister of Economic Affairs prohibited monopolistic practices seen to be operating in the distribution of groceries, such as preferential buyer lists, price trade discounts and profit margin collusion, collective negotiations over trade discounts with suppliers, collective boycotts of non-compliant suppliers, and exclusive dealing arrangements (South Africa 1958a, b). The Steyn Commission in 1977 was a later inquiry on the high concentration in the sector. For Britain , see Shaw et al. (2000), who argue that shifts towards large, national grocery chains in the 1920s and 1930s can partly be explained by changes in competition regulation.
- 13.
Between 1952 and 1960/61, the percentage share of total trading revenue accounted for by the 10 largest retail firms increased from 8.1 to 12.4. By 1966, the largest five firms made up 12.8% of the total retail turnover. OK Bazaars was the largest firm by turnover (Horvitch 1970, 43).
- 14.
Becca van der Walt, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Johannesburg, March 19, 2007.
- 15.
Hanalie Erasmus, interviewed by Venessa van der Walt and Bridget Kenny, Alberton, November 22, 2007.
- 16.
See Milanesio (2013) for working class consumers in this period in Argentina under Peron.
- 17.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 18.
Dinah Nhlabatsi, interviewed by Matlhako Mahapa, Johannesburg, January 20, 2013. Sales House was acquired by the department store Edgars in 1965. It marketed itself to black consumers.
- 19.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 20.
As early as the South African War and World War I, war brought women, particularly those on the Rand, into shop work as men went to fight. Their employment increased in the 1930s and during World War II (Gill 1957, 28; Berger 1992, 57). Household poverty also sent women out to work (Herd 1974, 21; Berger 1992, 34–35). For the general trend of white women entering wage labour during this period, see, for example, Berger (1992), Brink (1986, 23–54), Hyslop (1995, 61–62), Pollak (1932), and Vincent (2000). Indeed, the Carnegie Commission was set up in the early 1930s to report on the “Poor White problem” of proletarianizing rural whites. It was particularly interested in the phenomenon of young women entering factories to support their impoverished families (Albertyn et al. 1932; Grosskopf 1932; and on the Carnegie Commission, see Willoughby-Herard 2015). For women’s entry into retailing in other places, see, for example, Benson (1986), Leach (1993), and Johnson (2007) for the United States ; Humphrey (1998) for Australia ; Lerner (2015, 110–25) for Germany ; McBride (1978) for France ; Young (1999) for Japan; Sanders (2006) for Great Britain ; Randall (2008) for Soviet Russia ; and Hanser (2008) for a much later period in China .
- 21.
Maureen Williams, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Johannesburg, March 7, 2007.
- 22.
South African shop assistants had relatively high levels of education , possessing a minimum of Standard 6 (Grade 8) education, and often as high as Standard 8 (Grade 10) (Malherbe 1932, 105–7).
- 23.
Ingrid du Toit, interview.
- 24.
Johanna Coetzee, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Benoni, May 18, 2007.
- 25.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 26.
On black distributive workers , see Hirson (1990, 93–98), Harries (1981), and Hellmann (1953). It is important to note that coloured and Indian women made up a minority of the female population on the Rand in this period, in contrast to other areas like Cape Town or Durban, where more coloured and Indian women respectively entered service employment (see Berger 1992, 34–35). For a discussion of the limits to African women’s formal employment options on the Rand at this time, see Bonner (1990a), Eales (1989), Berger (1992, 58–67), and Hyslop (1995, 62).
- 27.
Raymond Williams (1977) used the term “structure of feeling” to articulate the less-than-conscious relations structuring categories, possibilities, and limits within ordinary everyday practices to explain the ambivalences and affect underpinning inequalities, sometimes reproducing them and other times offering resources to challenge them (see also Steedman 1987).
- 28.
Pauline Schmidt, interview.
- 29.
Johanna Coetzee, interview.
- 30.
Johanna Coetzee, interview.
- 31.
Irma Du Plessis (2011) argues that the figure of the domestic worker and her “familiarity” in South African apartheid social imaginary tied the nation to the intimacy of the family. She uses the word “familiar” to invoke both senses. For the long-established relationship between family and nation, particularly with reference to Afrikaner nationalism, see also Hofmeyr (1987) and McClintock (1995).
- 32.
Regional unions merged in December 1936, and the new national union was registered in 1937 (Herd 1974, 38–40). The NUDW was a relatively progressive union with regards to race (Berger 1992, 138; Alexander 2000, 62). However, union officials were split between the more conservative , white South African Labour Party and the “non-racial” Communist Party of South Africa. This division meant that the union reached limits on its position towards black workers , especially as the state increased restrictions over black trade union membership (see Alexander 2000; Desai 1997, 105). In areas where Indian and coloured women served as shop assistants, such as Cape Town and Durban, the union initially organized these workers within its main branch. When the NUDW was formed, the national conference endorsed a policy of parallel, “B” branche s under which to organize Indian and coloured workers (Desai 1997, 105–7; Herd 1974, 92). The African Commercial and Distributive Workers Union (ACDWU) organized African warehousemen , packers, and deliverymen (Hirson 1990, 93–98; Alexander 2000, 44–45, 62, 66–67).
- 33.
Desai (1997, 109–13).
- 34.
“Trials and Tribulations of Selling – As our Readers See Them,” New Day, November 1948, 14; G1; National Union of Distributive Workers (Natal Branch) Records 1937–1978 (AH1202); Historical Papers Research Archive, University of the Witwatersrand (hereafter cited as AH1202).
- 35.
Pauline Schmidt, interview.
- 36.
Ingrid du Toit, interview.
- 37.
The strike lasted 17 days and involved nearly 3000 workers across the Rand and in Cape Town. It involved many women strikers, and strike leaders and government ministers had to step in (Herd 1974, 116–23, Alexander 2000, 65–68). The NUDW was joined by the ACDWU , which organized black men (Alexander 2000, 67). An earlier OK Bazaars strike in 1942, also joined by ACDWU members, won resumption of shop committees, a closed shop (which employers reneged upon afterwards), and wage increases for black distributive workers (Hirson 1990, 97, 108; Alexander 2000, 44–45; Herd 1974, 96). Led by Daniel Koza, the ACDWU was active in this time, and won gains in wages for black male workers (Alexander 2000, 44–45, 62, 66–67; Herd 1974, 102; Hirson 1990, 96–98; see also “Good News for Distributive Workers,” New Day, October 1945, 28; G1; AH1202). However, unions organizing African workers, varying by sector, started weakening from around 1943/44 (Alexander 2000, 80–85) (see Chap. 4 for more detail).
- 38.
Pauline Schmidt, interview.
- 39.
Bessie White, quoted in Alexander (2000, 68). For women shop workers’ unions and resistance in other contexts that combined awareness of respectability with affirmation of themselves as workers, see Frank (2001), Opler (2007), Benson (1986), Ziskind (2003), Johnson (2007), and, more broadly, Enstad (1999), Cobble (2004), and Kessler-Harris (2007).
- 40.
Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, this multiple-company agreement was automatically extended by “gentlemen’s agreement” (Herd 1974, 138).
- 41.
See “The Distributive Trade as a Career” by Ruth Boonzaier, New Day, July 1949, 25; “Women’s Legal Disabilities,” New Day, September 1949, 28; “‘Men Must Work and Women Must Weep’ – The NUDW Says ‘No!’,” New Day, June 1949, 33; “Discrimination Against Married Women?,” New Day, March 1949, 15; G1; AH1202.
- 42.
The Wage Board was a statutory commission which reviewed Wage Determinations in particular sectors through a process of public hearings (see Chap. 4 for more discussion).
- 43.
Pauline Schmidt, interview.
- 44.
Ingrid du Toit, interview.
- 45.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 46.
Ingrid du Toit, interview.
- 47.
Pauline Schmidt, interview.
- 48.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 49.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 50.
Moira Campbell, interviewed by Bridget Kenny, Johannesburg, March 4, 2008.
- 51.
Hanalie Erasmus, interview.
- 52.
Becca van der Walt, interview.
- 53.
Johanna Coetzee, interview.
- 54.
Janice Tomlinson, interview. These quotes are taken directly from written reflections which she prepared for me for our interview. By “genteel” she means well-mannered.
- 55.
OK Bazaars, Ltd., “Directors’ Reports” in company annual reports for 1954, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962, 1963, and 1964; F1900/P/(a)51 National Accounts, Public Companies (SAB, SES); National Archive of South Africa (NASA) (hereafter cited as NASA F1900).
- 56.
OK Bazaars opened a supermarket in Kenilworth, Johannesburg, in 1955 (OK Bazaars, Ltd., Directors’ Report in company annual report, 1955; SANA F1900). The first Pick n Pay supermarket opened in 1967 (Joyce 1981, 283). The NUDW organized “supermarket workers” in 1961 (see “Calling Supermarket Members of C.T.C. Bazaars,” 1961; Qa 3.1; National Union of Distributive Workers (Witwatersrand Branch) Records 1939–1984 (AH1601); Historical Papers Research Archive, University of the Witwatersrand (hereafter cited as AH1601)). Supermarkets were larger than conventional grocery stores, with average sales areas of 12,000–15,000 square feet (Cook 1975, 100), which reduced costs in terms of unit margins (see also Humphrey 1998).
- 57.
At the same time, the state increased controls placed upon black township stores in 1968, adding 25 separate regulations governing these shops (Cook 1975, 126).
- 58.
OK Bazaars, Ltd., Directors’ Report in the company annual report, 1963; SANA F1900.
- 59.
Letter from A. Fife to R. Altman, July 4, 1960; Ua 41.2.2; AH1601.
- 60.
Letter from F. Botten to The Branch Secretary, National Union of Distributive Workers, February 13, 1964; Ua 41.2.2; AH1601.
- 61.
Letters from M. Kagan to D. A. Smith, December 14, 1971, and May 3, 1972; Ua 41.1.2; AH1601. Letter from M. Kagan to Mrs. Van Aswegen, April 7, 1971; Ua 41.2.6; AH1601.
- 62.
Letter from D. Hartwell to Mr. J. Mitchell, October 9, 1968; Ua 41.2.3; AH1601. See also “Minutes of Meeting of OK Bazaars Orange Grove, June 19, 1962”; Ua 41.3; AH1601. Letter from D. Hartwell to Mr. P. Chadwick, October 9, 1968; Ua 26.2a; AH1601.
- 63.
A letter from the Wits branch secretary to the national secretary of the NUDW in 1968 reported that one branch of OK Bazaars with 677 whites on the payroll lost 647 man-days due to absenteeism during April of that year. The branch secretary wrote that “the problem is of lesser magnitude in respect of the Coloured staff and is not a problem at all in respect of African staff” (Letter from B. Robarts to R. Altman, May 29, 1968; 41.2.3; AH1601).
- 64.
“Minutes of meeting of OK Bazaars, Orange Grove, June 19, 1962”; Ua 41.3; AH1601.
- 65.
Letter from M. Kagan to The General Manager of Greatermans, February 25, 1971; Ua 26.2.b; AH1601.
- 66.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. H. Fonn, July 3, 1975; Ua 26.2.c; AH1601.
- 67.
Letter from M. Kagan to F. Botten, April 11, 1969; Ua 41.2.4; AH1601. Letter from M. Kagan to H. B. Kampf, July 21, 1969; Ua 41.2.4; AH1601. Letters from M. Kagan to D. A. Smith, February 4, 1972, and May 3, 1972; Ua 41.2.7; AH1601. Letter from M. Kagan to D. A. Smith, May 23, 1975; Ua 41.2.10; AH1601. Also, see Letters from D. A. Smith to M. Kagan, August 28, 1972, and August 31, 1972; Ua 41.2.6; AH1601.
- 68.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mrs. Steyn, February 9, 1970; Ua 41.1.1; AH1601. “Bantu” refers to African workers.
- 69.
In retail, when black women—at first Indian and coloured and later African women, as we will see later—entered service jobs in Johannesburg, they entered the same jobs that white women occupied. In manufacturing, by contrast, there was an “upward floating colour bar” when white and coloured workers moved up as African men entered semi-skilled work in the 1970s (Webster 1985; Lewis 1984).
- 70.
“For Publication in New Day: Union Member gets her Job Back, but says, ‘No Thank You’,” c. 1972; Ua 41.1.3; AH1601.
- 71.
Pick n Pay advertisement for job of manager, The Star, May 3, 1971, C13; Ua 43.3; AH1601.
- 72.
Pick n Pay advertisement for job of cashier, The Star, November 3, 1971, B2; Ua 43.3; AH1601. Women were also offered medical aid and a pension fund.
- 73.
Darcie Hartwell, “Counter Attack,” Personality, March 27, 1969; Pa; AH1601.
- 74.
Letter from B. Roberts to R. Altman, March 9, 1969; Ua 41.2.1; AH1601.
- 75.
Letter from D. Hartwell to Mr. J. Rose, October 9, 1968; Ua 41.2.3; AH1601.
- 76.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. R. Duggan, July 14, 1976; Ua 12.2.6; AH1601.
- 77.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. L. May, March 17, 1971; Ua 26.2.6; AH1601.
- 78.
Letter from M. Kagan to The Manager, June 16, 1970; Ua 43.2; AH1601.
- 79.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. R. Duggan, November 20, 1975; UA 12.2.6; AH1601.
- 80.
Separate facilities were regulated by the Shops and Offices Act .
- 81.
South Africa’s GNP grew at an average rate of 6% annually during the 1960s (Gelb 1991).
- 82.
- 83.
J. R. Altman, NUDW Press Statement, May 23, 1969; Pa; AH1601. Industrial correspondent, “Shopworkers in direct appeal,” Rand Daily Mail, June 3, 1969; Pa; AH1601. Paulette Dupree, “Inquiry into ‘Mixed Serving in Shops’,” Sunday Express, October 5, 1969; Pa; AH1601. Job reservation was legislated by section 77 of the Industrial Conciliation Act.
- 84.
Paulette Dupree, “Inquiry into ‘Mixed Serving in Shops’,” Sunday Express, October 5, 1969; Pa; AH1601. See Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. K.B. Hartshorne, August 27, 1973; Ua 41.2.9; AH1601. NUDW Case Record C25/73, March 8, 1973; Ua 12.1; AH1601. “Questions and Answers in Parliament: Minister Denies White Workers Replaced,” New Day, May 1970, 8; G1; AH1202. “Separate development ” was the policy of the National Party that aimed to separate the population according to race and provide “appropriate” services corresponding to their hierarchical place in society.
- 85.
Paulette Dupree, “Inquiry into ‘Mixed Serving in Shops’,” Sunday Express, October 5, 1969; Pa; AH1601.
- 86.
“Editorial: The Effective Rate for the Job,” New Day, August 1970, 2–3; G1; AH1202. Industrial correspondent, “Shopworkers in direct appeal,” Rand Daily Mail, June 3, 1969; Pa; AH1601. Express reporter, “Stores Reply: ‘Not enough Whites’,” Sunday Express, 1969; Pa; AH1601. In the mid-1970s the concerns over African workers serving white customers in public places, such as bars, were also being tested legally (E. Galli from the Witwatersrand Liquor and Catering Trade Employees’ Union, “To Serve or not to Serve,” August 3, 1976; Rb2; AH1601).
- 87.
Letter from M. Kagan to Mr. A. Fife, August 10, 1970; Ua 41.2.5; AH1601.
- 88.
Bantu Laws Amendment Bill was debated furiously in Parliament. The Bantu Labour Act, No. 67 of 1964, consolidated laws regulating the employment of African workers, and was ministered under the Department of Bantu Administration and Development rather than the Department of Labour since Africans were excluded from the definition of “employee” (see Chap. 4).
- 89.
See Section 20A, Bantu Laws Amendment Act, No. 19, 1970, Government Gazette, March 6, 1970, No. 2657; Department of Bantu Administration and Development, No. R 531, Employment of Bantu in Certain Classes of Work, 1970, Government Gazette, April 3, 1970, No. 2679.
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Kenny, B. (2018). Servicing a Nation: White Women Shop Assistants and the Fantasy of Belonging. In: Retail Worker Politics, Race and Consumption in South Africa. Rethinking International Development series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69551-8_2
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