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Browsing History by Author "Badassy, Prinisha."

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    "- and my blood became hot!" : crimes of passion, crimes of reason : an analysis of the crimes against masters and mistresses by their Indian domestic servants, Natal, 1880-1920.
    (2005) Badassy, Prinisha.; Burns, Catherine E.
    This thesis posits that the experiences and emotional strain associated with being a domestic servant gave rise to a culture of anger and violence within the ranks of Indian Domestic Servants in Colonial Natal during the period 1880 to 1920. These acts of violence, in particular physical and indecent assault and poisoning are explored here not in admiration of their brutality, but for their historical relevance to the study of Indenture, more specifically in the area of servant-master/mistress relations. The study uses these crimes as a window into the social dynamics of the settler home and domestic space in Colonial Natal, since they were created within their own set of orchestrating emotions and situations. The thesis draws on international and local literature around master/mistress-servant relations as well as relations between domestic slaves and the owners of their labour at the same time in other regions of the world. The findings of this thesis contribute to the historiography of South Africa; to the historiography of Indian South African life; to the historiography of servantmaster/mistress relationships; to the analysis of the complex intermingling of private and public labour and lives bound up with this labour form, both in past moulds and in its present form; and to the growing literature on the linkages between utilizing analysis of legal institutions and legal records in researching and writing the history of South African lives. Most importantly however, this thesis is the story of ordinary men and women whose lives, cultures, individualities and histories intersected with the domestic and colonial nexus.
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    A severed umbilicus : infanticide and the concealment of birth in Natal, 1860-1935.
    (2011) Badassy, Prinisha.; Parle, Julie.
    This dissertation is an historical examination of the crimes of infanticide and the concealment of birth in Natal between 1860 and 1935, where more than thirty such cases were tried before the Supreme, Magistrate, and District Circuit Courts. This study does not look at the crime of infanticide and concealment of birth in isolation, however, but also considers the crime in relation to cases of „child murder,‟ still-births, and abortion, since the term infanticide itself was highly contested and only fully defined in legal terms in South Africa by 1910. Some of the key themes this study covers include the ways in which legislation changed over time (for instance, the concept of “concealment of birth” altered to “infanticide” and the naming of the potential perpetrator from “woman” to “person.”); the problems posed for medical jurisprudence in trying to prove a separate existence of an infant from its mother; and whether a „live birth‟ had occurred before a charge could be proffered. In Natal, it is clear that legislation shaped interpretation and practice, but practice and interpretation, across many social and institutional settings, also shaped legal definitions. Other arguments raised in this study relate to the “instability of the womb” and how puerperal insanity and emotional or psychological mental evidence began to outweigh the physical, bodily evidence in the courtroom. Furthermore, such issues as illegitimacy, baby-farming, infant life protection, mothercraft, miscegenation, incest, respectability, and local cultural practices are integral to understandings of the possible underlying motives for the acts of infanticide and concealment of birth. By tracing the meaning and incidences of infanticide and the concealment of birth across the social spectrum, this study offers insights into a range of issues in social, legal and medical history. These include: the study of the domain of the family; of labour and political economy; of medico-jurisprudence and clinical medicine; of changing gender power and hierarchies; and of gendered discourses of criminality