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This history of the African working class in Lourenco Marques proceeds from the assumption that Mozambican labour history was not fundamentally about skills, wages and productivity - it was about racism, human dignity and contested masculinity. Brutal forced-labour policies made it difficult for rural Africans to survive despite their continued access to agricultural land and family labour. Thus the majority of African men living in southern Mozambique spent their adult lives in wage labour, whether theyworked in the South African mines or took low-paying jobs in and around the port city of Lourenco Marques. This analysis brings the voices of African workers to the foreground and contrasts their historical vision with that found in letters, newspapers and confidential Portuguese documents. By detailing the individual experiences of gang labourers, stevedores, domestic servants and petty clerks, the author aims to focus the reader's attention on the human dimensions of colonial racism.