At Home in Empire: The Politics of Dwelling in France and Senegal, 1914-1974

This dissertation traces the rise and fall of the politics of dwelling in France and Senegal during the twentieth century. The politics of dwelling captures a framework that linked West Africans' political expectations and relationships to their ability to access the personal, social, and economic stability associated with home in the French Empire as well as its post-imperial successor states. West African and French actors began to articulate this connection in the early twentieth century to manage the transformations to familial relations and domestic spaces caused by migration, warfare, urbanization, and industrialization. This connection reached its apex in the aftermath of World War II and continued to structure political demands and institutions in France and Senegal until the mid 1970s. By focusing on West African labor migrants, soldiers, and urbanites, this dissertations shows how people in both France and Senegal increasingly tied governmental legitimacy to the state's ability to give West Africans domestic spaces that provided personal, social, and economic stability. This demonstrates that West Africans, and those trying to govern them, did not believe that political inclusion or exclusion derived solely from political or cultural representations. Rather, many people in France and Senegal believed that West Africans' relationship to the French and Senegal government throughout the twentieth century stemmed from whether or not state agencies could help West African dwellers find the comforts of home.