Illustrates the centrality of domestic politics to colonial rule and the ways in which mastery over servants was a key expression of colonial power

Claire Lowrie is Lecturer in History at the University of Wollongong, Australia

Introduction: Domestic service and colonial mastery in the tropics
1. A 'second Singapore'? The connected histories of Darwin and Singapore, 1860s-1930s
2. Historicising 'houseboys': cultures of male servitude in the tropics, 1880s-1910s
3. White masters and their Chinese 'houseboys': masculinity, sexuality and racial anxiety in the home, 1880s-1930s
4. White women and the case of the disappearing Chinese 'houseboys', 1910s-30s
5. Idle mems, weary wives and 'red hot revolutionaries': domestic tension and political antagonism in the home, 1910s-30s
6. Masters and colonisers: the politics of Chinese domestic mastery, 1920s-30s
Conclusion: Domestic service at the end of empire
Select bibliography of secondary sources
Index