De(coding) 'loose women' in colonial archives

Loose women are those whose behaviour and lifestyles do not fit the gendered norm of dependency and male patronage. Despite the elusive nature of the adjective 'loose', loose women are often visualised as sexually unrestrained, who need to be codified andcontrolled. The looseness of this category, and yet its strategic and historical use to restrain women, is curiously under-analyzed. I compare the history of the codification 'prostitutes' in British Colonial Africa (with a focus on South Africa and the Cape Colony), and British India to understand the impact of this codification. I argue that the codification of prostitution was not merely a reflection of colonial sexual anxieties but the need to restrain the autonomy of working women, at large. Colonial laws had a twin effect of controlling morality and (gendered) labour markets, by restricting women to the home or to labour markets deemed legitimate for their gender and race.