Inventaire d'enquêtes Demostaf

The history of Burkinabé migration since 1900 has been reconstructed mainly from colonial administration documents. This article endeavours to recreate that history from retrospective information collected within the context of a national inquiry on migration in Burkina Faso. While this distinctly “African” view concurs for the most part with the archival data, each source contributes its own specific dimension. Only on the phenomenom of outward migration do these sources differ. Well-presented in the colonial reports, this form of migration is “forgotten” by the inquiry of 1974–75.