Diamang was one of the many companies created at the turn of the twentieth century to explore and exploit the African continent. Large “pockets” of raw materials were loaned to these enterprises, which always put a lot of effort into building model company towns and villages. This chapter surveys how knowledge produced in and about space at mining sites evolved and travelled across empires over time, while looking at empirical experiences acquired on the ground. Diamang, based in Lunda, Angola, under the Portuguese colonial rule, will be used as a lens to address the impact of such flows on neighbouring regions as well as their entanglements with local departments and planning practices. Diving into the polyhedral nature of these networks, the text questions the still dominant state-centred frameworks of analysis that fail to disclose the strength of other circuits of knowledge.

Some arguments were discussed in the workshop In between Spaces, Actors and Infrastructures: Transimperial approaches to Mobility, University of Neuchâtel, 2021, organised by César Jacquier, and benefited from generous comments of all participants.

• Other Humanities - Humanities

This publication is an output of the following project(s):

• Architecture, Colonialism and Labour. The role and legacy of mass labour in the design, planning and construction of Public Works in former African territories under Portuguese colonial rule