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The Tanzania National Archives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 May 2014

Leander Schneider
Leander Schneider*
Affiliation:
Columbia University
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Extract

This note aims to provide an overview of the Tanzania National Archives (TNA) system and the records it houses. The system comprises a headquarters in Dar es Salaam and six regional branch offices located in Mbeya, Mwanza, Arusha, Dodoma, Tanga, and Singida. Access to the TNA requires a research permit from the Tanzania Commission for Research and Technology. It is best to apply well in advance. Attaching a letter of recommendation from a contact at the University of Dar es Salaam that comments specifically on the value of the proposed research project to the application can expedite its processing tremendously. Computers may be used in the archives and researchers may ask for specific folios to be photocopied. It is advisable to keep detailed records of requests.

The three major groups of materials retained within the TNA system are records from German colonial times (pre-1916/17), the British records (pre-1962), and records from various levels of government and administration of post-independence Tanzania (Tanganyika). Almost all colonial records in the collection are housed at the TNA headquarters, as are most of those post-independence documents that originate from central government and ministerial headquarters. A considerable number of post-1962 records originating from local level government and administration have also been moved to Dar es Salaam.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 30 , 2003 , pp. 447 - 454
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2003

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References

1 Wright, Marcia, “The Tanganyika Archives.” American Archivist 28(1965), 511–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Iliffe, JohnTanganyika Under German Rule, 1905-1912 (Cambridge, 1969)CrossRefGoogle Scholar also offers a brief assessment of the German colonial records in the TNA system.

2 These reports, prepared by two archives students and a consultant, are available in the Dar es Salaam TNA research/reading room. Patricia Hill's index dates from 1966, while the other two indices were produced in the early 1990s.

3 Larson, L.E., “Problems in the Study of Witchcraft Eradication Movements in Southern Tanzania,” Ufahamu 6/4(1976), 88–100Google Scholar.

4 A knowledgeable member of the TNA staff remembers the TNA possessing a register (possibly the colonial administrationis central register) that listed the 15,000, 16,000, and 50,000 series (stamped “confidential”). S/he had not, however, seen this register since the 1970s, and it could not be located in 2000.

5 Brennan, J.R., “Nation, Race and Urbanization in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, 1916-1976” (Ph.D., Northwestern, 2002)Google Scholar. Brennan (personal communication) recently saw an apparently comprehensive list of confidential files with an attached registry listing several files that had been consulted. As mysterously as it appeared at the TNA, this list has disappeared.

6 Most “Early Secretariat” files have a four-digit number. More recent Secretariat files all have five-digit numbers. There also appears to be a group of files with three-digit numbers, possibly those produced by the 1916-20 military administration. James Brennan was able to steal a glance at si list of such files, which again cannot now be located. While it is unclear whether the files contained in this list still exist, one of them at least was extensively used in the past (see Ranger, T.O., Dance and Society in Eastern Africa, 1890-1970 (Berkeley, 1975])Google Scholar. John Iliffe notes this very saine file as the only three-digit file among the Secretariat records of the TNA: Iliffe, , A Modern History of Tanganyika (Cambridge, 1979)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. My thanks to James Brennan for bringing this to my attention.

7 One must take care to specify the location of the branches one wishes to visit as research sites in one's application for a research permit with the Commission for Science and Technology.

8 For instance, Hodgson, Dorothy, Once Intrepid Warriors: Gender, Ethnicity, and the Cultural Politics of Maasai Development (Bloomington, 2001)Google Scholar, cites documents located in Arusha.

9 A Dodoma expedition also holds out the promise of considerable synergies, as the archives of the once-ruling TANU/CCM party arc housed at Dodoma party headquarters. The collection consists of nine accessions, some of which are accessible (confidential and personnel files are not). There are many valuable materials, ranging from speeches (there is an extensive tape collection of Julius Nyerere's speeches), minutes of meetings of various party committees (including those of the Central Committee), and reports and papers.