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7 Birkbeck L. Rev. 1 (2020)

handle is hein.journals/birkbek7 and id is 1 raw text is: Namrah Khan jCustom, Culture and Law in Colonial, Anti-Colonial and Postcolonial Times NAMRAH KHAN* Colonialism constructed legal identities and subjects many of which found their way into post-independence constitutional frameworks. The treatment of customary social practices and their codification into legal frameworks was part of the process of constructing legal identities. This article, drawing on the South African constitutional experience, examines how this process has led to the legacy of colonisation continuing and to the empowerment of elites in postcolonial society. Introduction Colonialism imposed and created legal identities on individuals living under colonial rule and the societies that were colonised. Systems of law were often transplanted from European societies and from systems of law which did not relate to societies on which they were imposed. British colonial legal systems, following liberal models of imperialism, often tried to incorporate or accommodate indigenous systems of government into colonial legal frameworks in order to facilitate effective colonial governance by elite figures within colonial societies. One of the lasting effects of this though was the appropriation into law and formalisation of customs and traditions which had predated colonial law. Namrah Khan completed her LLB Law at Birkbeck, University of London and is currently undertaking an LLM at the London School of Economics, where she has also served as an editor of the LSE Law Review. Her interests lie in public law, human rights law, postcolonial theory and critical race theory, among others. Special thanks are given to Professor Stewart Motha and Soody Gholami for their invaluable comments and feedback in the preparation of this article.

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