AGE OF CONCRETE
NEW AFRICAN HISTORIES
SERIES EDITORS: JEAN ALLMAN, ALLEN ISAACMAN, AND DEREK R. PETERSON
David William Cohen and E. S. Atieno Odhiambo, The Risks of Knowledge
Belinda Bozzoli, Theatres of Struggle and the End of Apartheid
Gary Kynoch, We Are Fighting the World
Stephanie Newell, The Forger’s Tale
Jacob A. Tropp, Natures of Colonial Change
Jan Bender Shetler, Imagining Serengeti
Cheikh Anta Babou, Fighting the Greater Jihad
Marc Epprecht, Heterosexual Africa?
Marissa J. Moorman, Intonations
Karen E. Flint, Healing Traditions
Derek R. Peterson and Giacomo Macola, editors, Recasting the Past
Moses E. Ochonu, Colonial Meltdown
Emily S. Burrill, Richard L. Roberts, and Elizabeth Thornberry, editors, Domestic Violence and the Law in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa
Daniel R. Magaziner, The Law and the Prophets
Emily Lynn Osborn, Our New Husbands Are Here
Robert Trent Vinson, The Americans Are Coming!
James R. Brennan, Taifa
Benjamin N. Lawrance and Richard L. Roberts, editors, Trafficking in Slavery’s Wake
David M. Gordon, Invisible Agents
Allen F. Isaacman and Barbara S. Isaacman, Dams, Displacement, and the Delusion of Development
Stephanie Newell, The Power to Name
Gibril R. Cole, The Krio of West Africa
Matthew M. Heaton, Black Skin, White Coats
Meredith Terretta, Nation of Outlaws, State of Violence
Paolo Israel, In Step with the Times
Michelle R. Moyd, Violent Intermediaries
Abosede A. George, Making Modern Girls
Alicia C. Decker, In Idi Amin’s Shadow
Rachel Jean-Baptiste, Conjugal Rights
Shobana Shankar, Who Shall Enter Paradise?
Emily S. Burrill, States of Marriage
Todd Cleveland, Diamonds in the Rough
Carina E. Ray, Crossing the Color Line
Sarah Van Beurden, Authentically African
Giacomo Macola, The Gun in Central Africa
Lynn Schler, Nation on Board
Julie MacArthur, Cartography and the Political Imagination
Abou B. Bamba, African Miracle, African Mirage
Daniel Magaziner, The Art of Life in South Africa
Paul Ocobock, An Uncertain Age
Keren Weitzberg, We Do Not Have Borders
Nuno Domingos, Football and Colonialism
Jeffrey S. Ahlman, Living with Nkrumahism
Bianca Murillo, Market Encounters
Laura Fair, Reel Pleasures
Thomas F. McDow, Buying Time
Jon Soske, Internal Frontiers
Elizabeth W. Giorgis, Modernist Art in Ethiopia
Matthew V. Bender, Water Brings No Harm
David Morton, Age of Concrete
Marissa J. Moorman, Powerful Frequencies
DAVID MORTON
AGE OF CONCRETE
HOUSING AND THE SHAPE OF ASPIRATION IN THE CAPITAL OF MOZAMBIQUE
OHIO UNIVERSITY PRESS
ATHENS
Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio 45701
© 2019 by Ohio University Press
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Morton, David, 1975- author.
Title: Age of concrete : housing and the shape of aspiration in the capital of Mozambique / David Morton.
Other titles: New African histories series.
Description: Athens, Ohio : Ohio University Press, 2019. | Series: New African histories | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019018753| ISBN 9780821423677 (hbk : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780821423684 (pbk : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780821446751 (pdf)
Subjects: LCSH: Housing--Mozambique--Maputo--History. | Maputo (Mozambique)--Economic conditions. | Maputo (Mozambique)--Social conditions.
Classification: LCC HD7374.A3 M37 2019 | DDC 363.5096791--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019018753
CONTENTS
Chapter 1: The Spaces of Lourenço Marques
Chapter 2: The Politics of Visibility
The “City of Reeds” Debate, 1962–65
Chapter 3: The Politics of Proximity
Clandestine Masonry House Construction in the Subúrbios, c. 1960–74
Chapter 4: An Immovable Legacy