Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant. Fluid Strategies: Water Management in Cape Colony and Natal Port Cities

2018年和2019年，由于降雨量减少和人口膨胀，开普敦经历了历史性的水资源短缺。另外三个主要沿海城市-伊丽莎白港、伦敦东部和德班-也感受到了供水和卫生基础设施方面越来越大的压力，这是一个日益严重的问题，这要归功于气候变化和基础设施维护资金不足。该项目通过探索1850年至1910年间英国占领的开普敦殖民地和纳塔尔这四个主要港口城市的水管理历史及其与公共卫生的关系来应对这一危机。虽然公共卫生和社会学的学者已经研究了市政管理人员和城市居民如何管理城市的清洁和废水，但很少有人把它们放在一起考虑。这项研究确立了居民和政府如何构建如何控制城市卫生和供水的想法。水是了解城市公共卫生优先事项的宝贵资源，因为它的广泛必要性和日益稀缺。这个项目考察了市政当局和城市居民之间的关系，以阐明这些城市在水管理和基础设施方面留下的殖民遗产。该项目的主要目标是揭示市政和居民行动如何相互冲突或相互合作；探索殖民地城市及其居民如何在日常公共卫生预防中使用卫生水的定义；以及展示非人类环境如何以及为什么使卫生工程和基础设施复杂化和影响。该项目通过使用历史方法分析来自西开普省档案馆和英国国家档案馆的文件，包括信件、居民请愿书、公共卫生和公害检查员报告、市政法规、报纸文章和市政委员会报告，从而实现这些目标。这些资料揭示了四个城市的行政和居民视角，描绘了供水和管理的日常现实。通过这样做，这个项目暴露了推动水使用和管理的种族、阶级和性别利益和价值观。它加深了我们对公共卫生的理解，解决了疾病暴发和水资源短缺如何产生对更有效率和更好维护的排水和供水基础设施的需求。在后殖民时代的城市，这是一个紧迫的问题，这些城市的市政当局经常继续使用殖民政府时期建造的基础设施，从而处理其遗产。该项目扩展了环境研究，展示了自然世界--植物、动物和其他非人类现象--如何持续存在于人们的决策中，特别是当它威胁到城市生存所必需的水等元素时。最终，这项研究表明，需要管理者和居民之间的合作和理解，才能认识到并纠正市政居民，特别是最脆弱的社会成员获得和提供公用事业的不成比例。这一裁决反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

In 2018 and 2019, Cape Town underwent historic water shortages resulting from decreased rainfall and a ballooning population. Three other major coastal cities—Port Elizabeth, East London, and Durban—have also felt increased stress on their water supply and sanitation infrastructure, a growing issue thanks to climate change and underfunded infrastructural maintenance. This project responds to this crisis by exploring the history of water management and its relationship to public health in these four major port cities of British-occupied Cape Colony and Natal between 1850 and 1910. While scholars in public health and sociology have examined how municipal administrators and urban residents manage cities’ clean and wastewater, few have considered them together. This research establishes how both residents and governments construct ideas about how to control urban sanitation and water supply. Water is a valuable resource to understand municipal public health priorities because of its widespread necessity and increasing scarcity. This project examines the relationship between municipal authorities and urban residents to illuminate the colonial legacies of water management and infrastructure in these cities. It aims to help those municipalities, among others, better understand the different perspectives and voices involved in clean and wastewater management.The main goals of this project are to reveal how municipal and resident actions come into conflict or cooperate with one another; explore how colonial municipalities and their residents use definitions of sanitary water in daily public health prevention; and demonstrate how and why the non-human environment complicates and influences sanitary engineering and infrastructure. The project addresses these goals by using historical methods to analyze documents from the Western Cape Archives and the UK National Archives, including correspondence, resident petitions, public health and nuisance inspector reports, municipal statutes, newspaper articles, and municipal committee reports. These sources uncover administrative and resident perspectives across the four cities that depict the day-to-day realities of water supply and management. In doing so, this project exposes the racial, class, and gendered interests and values driving water use and management. It deepens our understanding of public health by addressing how disease outbreaks and water shortages create the need for more efficient and better-maintained drainage and water delivery infrastructure. This is a pressing issue in postcolonial cities, where municipalities often continue to use infrastructure built under colonial governments and thus reckon with its legacies. The project expands on environmental studies by showing how the natural world—plants, animals, and other non-human phenomena—is constantly present in the decisions people make, particularly when it threatens elements like water that are necessary to a city’s existence. Ultimately, this research demonstrates that it takes cooperation and understanding between administrators and residents to recognize and redress disproportionate access and delivery of utilities to municipal inhabitants, particularly the most vulnerable members of society.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.