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It argues detainees expanded Gikuyu cultural practice, enforced accountability within family life, and sought to represent themselves to a British public.",{"@graph":14,"@context":73},[15,34,56],{"@type":16,"itemListElement":17},"BreadcrumbList",[18,23,27,31],{"item":19,"name":20,"@type":21,"position":22},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",1,{"item":24,"name":25,"@type":21,"position":26},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",2,{"item":28,"name":29,"@type":21,"position":30},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/","Research & Report",3,{"item":32,"name":10,"@type":21,"position":33},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/the-intellectual-lives-of-mau-mau-detainees/631558/",4,{"url":32,"name":10,"@type":35,"image":36,"author":41,"headline":10,"publisher":44,"fileFormat":47,"inLanguage":8,"description":12,"dateModified":48,"datePublished":49,"encodingFormat":47,"isAccessibleForFree":50,"interactionStatistic":51},"DigitalDocument",{"url":37,"@type":38,"width":39,"height":40},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/the-intellectual-lives-of-mau-mau-detainees/631558.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":42,"@type":43},"Liam","Person",{"url":19,"name":45,"@type":46},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-10-30","2026-10-22",true,{"@type":52,"interactionType":53,"userInteractionCount":55},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":54},"ViewAction",5,{"@type":57,"mainEntity":58},"FAQPage",[59,65,69],{"name":60,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":62},"What does the article focus on regarding Mau Mau detainees?","Question",{"text":63,"@type":64},"It examines the creative intellectual and social projects detainees pursued during detention, using private papers and correspondence as key evidence.","Answer",{"name":66,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":67},"Who is Gakaara wa Wanjau and what did he do during detention?",{"text":68,"@type":64},"Gakaara wa Wanjau is a Gikuyu writer who, during eight years of detention, composed plays, wrote ethnography and poetry, and carried on extensive correspondence with his family.",{"name":70,"@type":61,"acceptedAnswer":71},"How does the article describe detainees’ aims beyond defending ideology?",{"text":72,"@type":64},"It argues detainees were also opening new ways of doing Gikuyu culture, holding family members accountable, and representing themselves to a British public they hoped to persuade.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":32,"og:type":75,"og:title":10,"og:site_name":45,"og:description":12},"article",{"robots":77,"canonical":32},"index,follow",{"doc_id":79,"site_id":7},631558,1793111660,{"code":4,"msg":82,"data":83},"success",[84,88,92,96,100,105,110,114,119,122,126],{"id":22,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":85,"show_sort_weight":86,"slug":87},"Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":26,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":89,"show_sort_weight":90,"slug":91},"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":33,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":93,"show_sort_weight":94,"slug":95},"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":55,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":97,"show_sort_weight":98,"slug":99},"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":101,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":102,"show_sort_weight":103,"slug":104},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":106,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":107,"show_sort_weight":108,"slug":109},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":111,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":29,"show_sort_weight":112,"slug":113},8,30,"research-report",{"id":115,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":116,"show_sort_weight":117,"slug":118},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":117,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":120,"show_sort_weight":117,"slug":121},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":123,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":124,"show_sort_weight":123,"slug":125},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":127,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":25,"category_name":128,"show_sort_weight":55,"slug":129},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":82,"data":131},{"doc_id":79,"user_id":132,"nickname":42,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":111,"category_name":29,"doc_title":10,"doc_description":12,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":55,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":22,"is_downloadable":22,"audit_status":22,"page_count":127,"language":139,"language_code":8,"site_id":7,"html_lang":8,"table_of_contents":140,"faqs":141,"seo_title":142,"seo_description":12,"update_tm":143,"read_time":144},8796095461564,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_155a257f0dc6eb9ab79c44ca47cae57d","Journal of African History, 49 (2008), pp. 73–91. f 2008 Cambridge University Press 73  \ndoi:10 . 1017/S0021853708003411 Printed in the United Kingdom  \nTHE I NTEL LEC T UAL L I V ES OF MAU M A UD E T A I N E E S*  \nBY DEREK R. PETERSON  \nUniversity of Cambridge  \nABSTRACT : This article illuminates the creative intellectual and social projects in which Mau Mau detainees were engaged. It draws on the private papers of Gakaara wa Wanjau, a Gikuyu writer who during his eight years of detention composed several plays, wrote ethnography and poetry, and carried on an extensive correspondence with his family. Gakaara and other detainees were doing more than defending a Mau Mau ideology. They were opening up new ways of doing Gikuyu culture, holding wives and children accountable, and representing themselves to a British public that could, they hoped, be brought round to their side.  \nKEY WORDS : Kenya, intellectual, family, prison.  \nGAKAA RA wa Wanjau was born in 1921 in Nyeri district, in northern central Kenya. His mother and father were among the earliest converts at the Presbyterian mission at Tumutumu. After two years spent at the Alliance High School, Gakaara joined the King’s African Rifles as a clerk. By 1948, he was sometime Chairman of the Nakuru branch of the Rift Valley Agikuyu Union, which aimed to ‘do away with prostitution’.1 That same year he published a book entitled Wanawake wa siku hizi (Women of These Days) . He told potential buyers that the book ‘abhors the bad reputation brought up by lazy African women who roam about shamefully in town with nothing todo but prostitution … [and] encourages the African girls who lead good ways of life’.2 While Gakaara lamented women’s dissolute behavior, he at the sametime had his own reputation to worry over. Gakaara’s family lacked secure title to the land they occupied. And Gakaara himself was languishing as a railway clerk, unable to secure a promotion. In a 1949 questionnaire he filledin for the British Institute of Practical Psychology, Gakaara complained that‘I have much propaganda to make be a big man whereas I have no ways’. In reply to the question ‘Do you feel your life lacks purpose?’, Gakaara wrote  \n* References to archives are abbreviated as follows: KNA: Kenya National Archives, Nairobi; GW: Gakaara wa Wanjau papers, Yale University Library, New Haven, Connecticut; RH: Rhodes House Library, Oxford; Bristol: Imperial and Commonwealth Museum, Bristol; PRO: Public Records Office, Kew (now the National Archive); PCEA: Presbyterian Church of East Africa archives, Nairobi; ACK: Anglican Church of Kenya archives, Nairobi; EUL: Edinburgh University Library; CBMS: Conference of British Missionary Societies archive, School of Oriental and African Studies, London. Research for this article was conducted with the assistance of the British Academy and the Smuts Fund at the University of Cambridge. Gakaara wa Wanjau’s papers were seen at Yale University Library courtesy of Dorothy Woodson and Ann Biersteker. Joseph Kariuki translated much of Gakaara’s Gikuyu-language correspondence.  \n1 KNA JZ 7/6: S. Fazan, ‘Petition no. 632: J. J. Gakaara Wanjau’, 12 July 1954 .  \n2 GW correspondence, 1948–9 file: Gakaara to East Africa Command, n.d. [Jan. 1949] .  \n74 DEREK R. PETERSON  \n‘Yes, because of poverty’. And when asked ‘Are you inclined to turn away your eyes when people look straight at you?’, Gakaara wrote: ‘Yes. Big people, more educated and very rich’.3  \nGakaara had his reputation in mind when, in July 1952, he took a Mau Mau oath.4 Like other partakers of the oath in Nyeri district, Gakaara committed himself to work for the common good, to stay away from prostitutes, to abjure sorcery and to fight for ithaka na wˆıathi, for ‘property and selfmastery’, the right to social respect.5 On 20 October, Gakaara was arrested and accused of fomenting Mau Mau ideology. British officers thought he was‘probably a sincere fanatic of unstable mental balance’.6 He was detained for eight years, fir","cbCaign1i7hC81R9","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaign1i7hC81R9","pdf",133189,"English","# Abstract\n# Life and early career of Gakaara wa Wanjau\n# Mau Mau oath, arrest, and detention timeline\n# Writing, research, and cultural production in detention","[{\"question\":\"What does the article focus on regarding Mau Mau detainees?\",\"answer\":\"It examines the creative intellectual and social projects detainees pursued during detention, using private papers and correspondence as key evidence.\"},{\"question\":\"Who is Gakaara wa Wanjau and what did he do during detention?\",\"answer\":\"Gakaara wa Wanjau is a Gikuyu writer who, during eight years of detention, composed plays, wrote ethnography and poetry, and carried on extensive correspondence with his family.\"},{\"question\":\"How does the article describe detainees’ aims beyond defending ideology?\",\"answer\":\"It argues detainees were also opening new ways of doing Gikuyu culture, holding family members accountable, and representing themselves to a British public they hoped to persuade.\"}]","The Intellectual Lives of Mau Mau Detainees | PDF",1792669258,48]