Chinese Exclusion – Genealogical Inclusion

Karen Harris, 08 March 2025

Karen Harris’s research focuses primarily on the Chinese in the southern African region throughout the colonial period, apartheid to the new democratic dispensation and was used in court cases regarding BEE and hate speech and the SA Chinese community.

The talk considers the Labour Importation Act and the Chinese Exclusion Act promulgated in the Transvaal Colony and the Cape Colony in 1904 as veritable sources for genealogical research. It traces the early history of the Chinese in the global South that culminated in the introduction of ordinances, regulations as well as legislation to prescribe and prohibit their movement and occupation.

It distils a few cases from these records to reveal the glimpses of genealogy they contain and how these can contribute to an understanding of Afrikaner ancestry and identity in the context of a genetic admixture.