‘Jaguda boys’: pickpocketing in Ibadan, 1930–60

By examining the development of pickpocketing by juveniles ( jaguda in Yoruba) in the later colonial era, the paper provides important information on popular urban society in the most populous city in Nigeria and tropical Africa: Ibadan. Representations of the urban experience for a group of criminally-minded citizens are detailed through explorations of street-life, public order, citizenry and neighbourhood reactions. It contributes to the emerging literature on urban patterns in colonial Africa, especially the growth of non-ethnic associations among the lower orders. The resistance of pickpockets to powerful attempts to inculcate conformist modes of behaviour through indigenous and colonial agencies of control and manipulation is highlighted. Both authority systems failed to tackle the problem of street crime beyond the banishment of offenders – a superficial, short-term solution to a well-rooted deviant urban youth culture.