Year: 2009
Type: dissertation
Abstract: This thesis seeks to document the life and work of veteran Durban trade unionist Harriet \nBolton, with a particular focus on the years from 1944 to 1974. Harriet Bolton lived and \nworked through many of the crucial developments in South Africa’s labour history, and \nher personal history is closely entwined with this broader history. Her recorded memories \nof her years as a trade unionist offer a unique ‘way in’ to revisiting South Africa’s labour \nhistory and particularly the critical period of Durban’s early 1970s. Harriet’s testimony, \ngathered through a series of interviews, forms a core narrative throughout the thesis. \nHowever, archive and newspaper material provide detailed contextualisation for the \ninterviews and opportunity to gain some perspective on questions of memory and of \nHarriet’s own relationship with history. Her recorded memories of these years \nsubstantially concern her experience as a trade unionist, but also as a working woman \nwho was a wife and mother, later a widow as well as an engaged citizen of Durban \nsociety through her involvement in community organisations and welfare groups. As \nsuch, deeper insight into what it meant to be a working woman of her generation is \ngained. An important component of the thesis is a consideration of the history and \npolitics of the Garment Workers Industrial Union (Natal) and its workers. The union was \nfounded by Harriet’s husband Jimmy Bolton, and was for forty years closely associated \nwith the name and legacy of the Boltons. I examine Harriet’s leadership of this union in \nthe context of the shifting demographics of the union, and a changed political and \neconomic landscape in South Africa. This thesis is also concerned with the role that the \nTrade Union Council of South Africa played during the period under consideration. \nHarriet’s relationship with TUCSA and her experience as a white woman trade unionist \norganising black trade unions ‘within’ the structures of this organisation provide the \nhistorian with a unique perspective on TUCSA’s somewhat under-researched history. \nHarriet’s role as a trade unionist during the tumultuous and critical period of the early \n1970s, and a consideration of her contribution to the emerging non-racial trade union \nmovement, is an important component of the thesis. The years both pre and post the 1973 \nstrike wave are revisited through Harriet’s lens. Insights in to the question of women’s \nroles and contribution to South Africa’s labour movement are generated through gaining \nan understanding of Harriet’s perspectives.
Author: Hannah. Keal
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1541109771