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Gujarati Shoemakers in Twentieth-Century Cape Town: Family, Gender, Caste and Community

Noting the Natal and Witwatersrand-centredness of the historiography of Indian South Africans, and this historiography's neglect of caste amongst Gujarati Hindus where caste mattered, this study focuses on the Gujarati shoemaker caste in Cape Town. Through narratives of those engaged in making, repairing or selling shoes, the article seeks to understand caste as occupation and explores how caste organisation facilitated economic and social mobility beyond the world of shoemaking. By drawing attention to female shoemakers, for whom the South African setting was challenging yet empowering, the article disturbs an androcentric reading of the term shoemaker and points to the family as a crucial economic unit.