The bibliographic array for the study of Africa and African scholarship has reached proportions which were unthinkablefiftyyears ago at the birth ofAfrican Studies Programs. Not only has the bibliographic coverage marshalled material in all areas of research but this coverage is readily available at the click of a computer in most corners of the globe. In an ideal world the actual resources would also be accessed with ease and digital speed. Indeed much research material is readily obtained in microfilm, microform, and CD-Rom format. However the bulk of retrospective, archival, ephemeral, and manuscript literature is to be found only in a few selected centres often far removed from students and scholars, especially those based in Africa.

This note attempts to evaluate the more significant studies on migratory labour in Africa,1 and to suggest some of the information needed not only to advance knowledge but also to provide a basis for governmental policy.There are two important elements of migratory labour as discussed in this note: the impermanent attachment to the labour force, and the absence from home. An increasing proportion of ‘wanderers who travel in search of wage labor’ (Carter Goodrich, ‘Migratory Labor’, in Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, New York, Macmillan, 1933) become, at least during their individual working lives, permanent members of the wage labour force.2 Petty traders, as well as the still frequently expatriate high-level manpower, who manifest some of the characteristics of migrant labour, are excluded from any discussion in this note.

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