Research Articles (Anthropology and Sociology)

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With shouts of Afrika!�: The 1952 textile strike at good hope textiles, King William's town
(Social Dynamics, 1990) Minkley, Gary
This paper, through a detailed examination of one of the biggest and most significant strikes in the East London region, suggests its importance lies both in the events and processes of the strike itself, and in its longer term impact on political traditions of union and popular struggle. It argues that a dynamic relationship developed between a newly emergent industrial working class in the textile industry, and an equally rapidly established local ATWIU, and local ANC branch. This resulted in the merging of a pattern of worker discontent and strike action with the ANCs Defiance Campaign in particular, and in so doing, the nature and direction of the strike was transformed. Finally it is argued that the defeat of this �mass� strike of defiance by the textile workers, laid the patterns and built the disillusions of future labour struggles in the region. � 1990 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.
Impact of social interactions in the community on the transmission of tuberculosis in a high incidence area
(BMJ Publishing Group, 1999) Classen, Collette N; Warren, Robin; Richardson, Madeleine
Tuberculosis (TB) is transmitted by close contact with an infectious person. It is assumed that close contact occurs amongst household members and that contact outside the house is �casual� and does not play a major role in the transmission of TB. This study was conducted in an impoverished area with a high incidence of TB and a low HIV seropositive prevalence. Thirty three households with 84 TB patients were identified between February 1993 and April 1996 and the transmission of TB was studied by combining Mycobacterium tuberculosis fingerprinting with in depth sociological interviews.
At the limits of spatial governmentality: A message from the tip of Africa
(Taylor and Francis Group, 2002) Robins, Steven
Urban studies scholars drawing on Foucault�s analysis of govern-mentality have investigated how urban social orders are increasingly moreconcerned with the management of space rather than on the discipline ofoffenders or the punishment of offences (Merry, 2001). This paper examines the�rationality� and efficacy of spatial governmentality in post-apartheid CapeTown, and shows how the city has increasingly become a �fortress city� (Davis,1990), much like cities such as Los Angeles, Sao Paolo and Rio de Janeiro. These�global cities� are increasingly characterised by privatised security systems inmiddle class suburbs, shopping malls and gated communities (Caldeira, 1999).These spatial forms of governmentality draw on sophisticated security systemscomprising razor wire and electrified walls, burglar alarms and safe rooms, aswell as vicious guard dogs, neighbourhood watches, private security companies,and automated surveillance cameras.
AIDS activism and globalisation from below: Occupying new spaces of citizenship in post-apartheid South Africa
(Institute of Development Studies, 2004) Robins, Steven; von Lieres, Bettina
Former President Nelson Mandela, Bono, Peter Gabriel and other superstars stood together on the stage at Greenpoint StadiuminCape Town in front of billions of television viewers around the world, watching the �46664�music extravaganza in support of the fight against AIDS in Africa. AIDS is clearly a global pandemic and responses to it have inevitably been on a global scale. At the same time, the disease has highly localised aspects to it. AIDS activists have had to address both the global dimensions and the local specificities of this epidemic.
'We can be united, but we are different': discourse of difference in postcolonial Namibia
(Forum Press, 2010) Akuupa, Michael
Social scientists who have written about the dynamics of festival rituals have analysed such practices variously as celebrations of commonality, as the enhancement of social cohesion, or as expressions of nostalgia. Festivals have also been studied as spaces, where information is disseminated to the public. This paper demonstrates that in postcolonial Namibia, cultural festivals have become avenues where discourses of difference and belonging are emphasised and contested by local people, festival participants and state officials through a range of ethnic-cultural presentations. The paper is primarily concerned with the �making� of Kavango identity as distinctively different from that of other ethnic groups in postcolonial Namibia. This process takes place in a particular political space, that of the culture festivals, which the state has organised and staged since the mid-1990s. Every year during the Annual National Culture Festivals representatives of Namibia�s various ethnic groups gather to �showcase� and express their diversity. Representatives of the state have time and again emphasised, couched in a discourse of �unity in diversity�, the importance of bringing together the country�s previously segregated population groups. The paper shows that while the performers act out diversity through dance and other forms of cultural exhibition, the importance of belonging to the nation and a larger constituency is simultaneously highlighted.
Narratives of HIV disclosure and masculinity in a South African village
(Routledge, 2012) fecane, Sakhumzi
This paper describes men�s experiences of disclosing their HIV status, arguing thatdisclosure restored their social respect, which was previously undermined by an illnessfrom AIDS. Results are from a 14-month ethnographic study conducted in ruralSouth African health facility, among a group of 25 men attending an AIDS supportgroup. The men included in this study tested while they were critically ill and somewere negatively labelled as �already dead� because of their poor state of health. Themajority voluntarily disclosed their HIV status to the public after recovering from thephysical symptoms of AIDS. This elicited positive reaction from the community, whotreated them with admiration for disclosing their HIV status. The paper emphasisesthe fact that the good response received by participants from the community waspredicated mainly on having healthy physical looks that men gained from usingantiretroviral medication. This paper then further analyses the ways in which a �healthyappearance� facilitates disclosure of HIV status and also disrupts the stigma attached toHIV in the studied community.
Chinese devils, the global market, and the declining power of Togo�s Nana-Benzes
(Cambridge University Press, 2013) Sylvanus, Nina
This article examines the shifting representations of and discourses produced about Chinese salesmen and their collaborators in the small West African nation of Togo. It suggests that in this context representations of China�s so-called New Scramble for Africa are troublesome, namely because they tend to silence the role of Togolese women traders as producers and as central historical and economic subjects in the making of a postcolonial commodity chain for printed African textiles. In so doing the article questions standard economic theories of global market forces, debunks stereotypes regarding the Chinese advance in West African markets, and challenges assumptions about the vulnerability of African societies.
The politics and aesthetics of commemoration: national days in southern Africa
(Taylor & Francis, 2013) Becker, Heike; Lentz, Carola
The contributions to the special section in this issue study recent independence celebrations and other national days in South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Madagascar and the Democratic Republic of Congo. They explore the role of national days in state-making and nation-building, and examine the performativity of nationalism and the role of performances in national festivities. Placing the case studies in a broader, comparative perspective, the introduction first discusses the role of the state in national celebrations, highlighting three themes: firstly, the political power-play and contested politics of memory involved in the creation of a country�s festive calendar; secondly, the relationship between state control of national days and civic or popular participation or contestation; and thirdly, the complex relationship between regional and ethnic loyalties and national identifications. It then turns to the role of performance and aesthetics in the making of nations in general, and in national celebrations in particular. Finally, we look at the different formats and meanings of national days in the region and address the question whether there is anything specific about national days in southern Africa as compared to other parts of the continent or national celebrations world-wide.
Perceptions of traditional health practitioners on violence in the Helderberg Municipal Area, Western Cape
(AOSIS OpenJournals, 2013) Gibson, Diana
This study on perceptions of violence was conducted with 56 traditional health practitioners (diviners: amagrirha) in the Helderberg Municipal Area of Cape Town Metro. It forms a subsection of a larger study on African medicine. This particular research focuses on how traditional health practitioners perceive violence, including gender-related violence. Individual, in-depth interviews were done with 21 traditional health practitioners and focus group discussions were held with 35 participants. The paper reports on their understanding of, as well as the meanings attached to, community and gender-based violence in an urban setting. The traditional health practitioners related violence to a range of disconnections in society, ranging from not adhering to traditional norms and practices, to breaks in relations between parents and children, within families and in marital- and sexual relations. They referred to a general sense of disjuncture between the living and the ancestral worlds. The accumulative effect of this sense of not being connected was seen as damaging and a precursor to violence. In two sites where there were high concentrations of violence, ceremonies were held to purify the areas by ritual. In addition to attending to the physical manifestations of illness, distress and violence, these traditional health practitioners attempted to enhance and restore proper social relationships between the living, as well as between the living and the dead.
'Pale face'/ 'pointy face': SA criminology in denial
(Institute for Security Studies (ISS), 2013) Henkeman, Sarah
This paper responds to key aspects of Bill Dixon's article, Understanding 'Pointy Face': What is criminology for? It suggests that criminology should unambiguously be 'for' social justice in South Africa's transhistorically unequal context. South African prison statistics are used as a conceptual shortcut to briefly highlight racialised constructions of crime, the criminal and the criminologist. A trans-disciplinary conceptual approach, as a more socially just way to understand violent crime in South Africa, is proposed. A methodological framework, which draws on the notion of cultural-structural-direct violence and intersectional theory, is presented. These extend Bill Dixon's call for criminology to include history, structure, human psyche and biography5 and resonates with Biko Agozino's call for a 'counter-colonial' criminology. The paper ends by returning the Eurocentric gaze of most South African criminologists, calling them out on their denial about trans-historical violence that implicates 'Pale Face' in the violence of 'Pointy Face'.
From 'One Namibia, One Nation' towards 'Unity in Diversity? Shifting representations of culture and nationhood in Namibian Independence Day celebrations, 1990-2010
(Taylor & Francis, 2013) Akuupa, Michael; Kornes, Godwin
In 2010 Namibia celebrated its twentieth anniversary of independence from South African rule. The main celebrations in the country�s capital Windhoek became the stage for an impressively orchestrated demonstration of maturing nationhood, symbolically embracing postcolonial policy concepts such as �national reconciliation�, �unity� and �diversity�. At the same time, nation building in post-apartheid Namibia is characterised by a high degree of social and political fragmentation that manifests itself in cultural and/or ethnic discourses of belonging. Taking the highly significant independence jubilee as our vantage point, we map out a shift of cultural representations of the nation in Independence Day celebrations since 1990, embodied by the two prominent slogans of �One Namibia, one Nation� and �Unity in Diversity�. As we will argue, the difficult and at times highly fragile postcolonial disposition made it necessary for the SWAPO government, as primary nation builder, to accommodate the demands of regions and local communities in its policy frameworks. This negotiation of local identifications and national belonging in turn shaped, and continues to shape, the performative dimension of Independence Day celebrations in Namibia.
An aligned alliance in allegiance to the drum beat of higher education's transformation agenda: A critical discourse lens
(MCSER Publishing, 2014) Ma�rtin-Cairncross, Anita
This paper includes an overview of transformation challenges faced by Higher Education globally, nationally and provides concluding remarks of the urgency that all staff who works in this sector understands and exemplify the transformation agenda. The study is contextualized within the framework of the critical discourse analysis (CDA) paradigm. This interpretive conceptual framework allows for the discussion of perceptions and interpretations of reports, debates and relevant document to substantiate arguments. Current trends in transformation in Higher Education, principles and goals of Higher Education Transformation in South Africa and several policy imperatives to drive the transformation agenda are discussed through a critical discourse lens.
Traditional health practitioners� perceptions, herbal treatment and management of HIV and related opportunistic infections
(BMC, 2014) Davids, Denver; Blouws, Tarryn; Aboyade, Oluwaseyi
In South Africa, traditional health practitioners� (THPs) explanatory frameworks concerning illness aetiologies are much researched. However there is a gap in the literature on how THPs understand HIV-related opportunistic infections (OIs), i.e. tuberculosis, candidiasis and herpes zoster. This study aimed to comprehend THPs� understandings of the aforementioned; to ascertain and better understand the treatment methods used by THPs for HIV and OIs, while also contributing to the documentation of South African medicinal plants for future conservation. The study was conducted in two locations: Strand, Western Cape where THPs are trained and Mpoza village, Mount Frere, Eastern Cape from where medicinal plants are ordered or collected. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 53 THPs of whom 36 were diviners (amagrirha: isangoma) and 17 herbalists (inyanga). THPs were selected through a non-probability �snowball� method. Data were analysed using a thematic content analysis approach.
Simulacral, genealogical, auratic and representational failure: Bushman authenticity as methodological collapse
(Taylor & Francis, 2014) Ellis, William F.
This article engages with the concept of authenticity as deployed in anthropology. The first section critiques authenticity as a simple reference to cultural purity, a traditional isomorphism or historical verisimilitude or as an �ethnographic authenticity�. Demarcation of authenticity must take into account philosophical literature that argues that authenticity is an existential question of the �modern� era. Thus, authenticity is offered to us as individuals as a remedy for the maladies of modernity: alienation, anomie and alterity. Authenticity is then discussed as a question of value within an economy of cultural politics that often draws on simulacra, creating cultural relics of dubious origin. The final section discusses various methodological failures and problematiques that are highlighted by the concern for, and scrutiny of, authenticity. The first is the simulacral failure. The subjects of anthropology are mostly real flesh-and-blood people-on-the-ground with real needs. In contrast is the simulacral subject, the brand, the tourist image, the media image or the ever-familiar hyper-real bushmen. Lastly, the article considers what Spivak calls �withholding� � a resistance to authentic representation by the Other. Resistance suggests a need for a radically altered engagement with the Other that includes both a deepening, and an awareness, of anthropology as a process of common ontological unfolding.
Essential medicines in Nigeria: foregrounding access to affordable essential medicines
(CODESRIA, 2014) Obuaku-Igwe, Chinwe C.
Within every functional healthcare system, access to quality and affordable essential medicine stands out as one of the building blocks. However, its significance has been underrated due to poor advocacy and research. The implication is that access to quality and affordable essential medicines remains a challenge to many people in low / middle income countries and could create difficulty in the attempt to reform healthcare systems and save lives if not given ample attention. This paper presents a critical discussion of the Nigerian health system with special focus on access to essential medicines as a component of the Nigerian healthcare system by drawing upon primary data, using qualitative research method.
South Africa: anthropology or anthropologies?
(American Anthropological Association, 2015) Becker, Heike; Spiegel, Andrew D.
A direct result of South Africa�s specific history has been the extraordinary significance of its contested, if not conflicting, political and ideological positions on anthropology�s South African trajectories. This was particularly true for the apartheid era between 1948 and the early 1990s when, as Robert Gordon and Andrew Spiegel (1993:86) have observed, South African anthropology had largely succumbed to apartheid as the dominant power in the country and in the region as a whole, with �its discourse perniciously dictating what should be written by both its supporters and, significantly, its opponents.� Yet, as we demonstrate in this article, sociopolitical historical circumstances were momentous factors in the development of the discipline from its beginnings in South Africa in the early 1920s, and they continue to influence contemporary debates and practices.
Against trauma: silence, victimhood, and (photo-) voice in Northern Namibia
(UFS, 2015) Becker, Heike
The article shows how the discourses of trauma, victimhood and silence regarding local agency contributed to the production of the nationalist master narrative in postcolonial Namibia. However, I point out repositories of memory beyond the narratives of victimhood and trauma, which began to add different layers to the political economy of silence and remembrance in the mid-2000s. Through revisiting visual forms of remembrance in northern Namibia an argument is developed, which challenges the dichotomy between silence and confession. It raises critical questions about the prominent place that the trauma trope has attained in memory studies, with reference to work by international memory studies scholars such as Paul Antze and Michael Lambek (1996) and South African researchers of memory politics, particularly the strategies of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). The fresh Namibian material supports the key critique of the TRC, which suggests that the foregrounding of pain and victimhood, and rituals of therapy and healing entailed a loss of the political framings of the testimonial moments.
From �to die a tribe and be born a nation� towards �culture, the foundation of a nation�: the shifting politics and aesthetics of Namibian nationalism
(Otjivanda Presse, 2015) Becker, Heike
Namibia�s postcolonial nationalist imaginary is by no means homogeneous. Overall, however, it is conspicuous that as Namibia celebrates her twenty-fifth anniversary of independence, national identity is no longer defined primarily through the common history of the liberation struggle but through the tolerant accommodation, even wholehearted celebration, of cultural difference. This article attempts to understand the shifting politics and aesthetics of Namibian nationalism from two interconnected angles. On the one hand, it takes a historical perspective; it looks into shifting discourses and practices of nationalism over the past century, starting from the anti- colonial resistance at the turn to the 20th century through to the twenty-fifth anniversary of Namibian independence. On the other hand, the article investigates the cultural redefinition of the bonds between the Namibian people(s), which has been a significant aspect of the constructions of postcolonial Namibian nationhood and citizenship. The argument highlights urban social life and cultural expression and the links between everyday life and political mobilization. It thereby emphasizes the nationalist activism of the developing Black urban culture of the post-World War II era and the internal urban social movements of the 1980s.
Embodied urban health and illness in Cape Town: Children�s reflections on living in Symphony Way temporary relocation area
(National Inquiry Services Centre, 2015) Prah, Efua
This paper explores ideas about health and illness held by six children who live in the Symphony Way Temporary Relocation Area in Cape Town, South Africa. The research shows that solutions to illness and health problems held by low-income populations are critically shaped by various characteristics of society � the surrounding neighbourhood, the family and the experience of the individual child. This contests current policy assumptions that solutions to wellness are not located within the lived experience of local populations. The findings are part of continued efforts to investigate how health is negotiated in low-income areas, what challenges people face and how they overcome such challenges. The research discusses ideas of health embodiment in relation to both the socio-economic and natural environment, and illustrates the impact that poor housing-quality and access to health care services have on health and ideas of health and illness.
Ons is Boesmans: commentary on the naming of Bushmen in the southern Kalahari
(National Inquiry Services Centre, 2015) Ellis, William F.
This paper examines academic debates about the nomenclature of the San in light of recent ethnographic data. Academic debates centre around two aspects: the apparent complicity of the term �bushman� in construing the San as lower on the hierarchy of race and class; and the construction of the San as being in close contact with animals and nature. Academics have sought to resolve this dilemma of complicity by adopting self-referential terms, which would allow them to overcome the effacement of cultural and linguistic variation. Critically, the paper argues that this turn to self-referential terms is problematic in the case of the ?Khomani San of the southern Kalahari because the San themselves claim �bushman� as their identity. The analysis suggests that the ?Khomani San claim this name for themselves in a context of developmental needs. Thus, ?Khomani San chose the name �Bushman� for themselves because it can be commoditised.

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