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Twenty Years Into Post-Apartheid South African Democracy; Diversities Vol. 15, No. 2, 2013 Diversity and Small Town Spaces: Twenty Years into Post-Apartheid South African Democracy Guest Editors: Richard Ballard and Melissa Steyn Diversity and Small Town Spaces in Post-Apartheid South Africa: An Introduction 1 by Melissa Steyn (University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa) and Richard Ballard (University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa) Troubled Transformation: Whites, Welfare, and ‘Reverse-Racism’ in Contemporary Newcastle 7 by Michelle Peens and Bernard Dubbeld (Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology at Stellenbosch University) Deserting Tra nsformation: Heritage, Tourism, and Hegemonic Spatiality in Prince Albert 23 by Haley A. McEwen (Wits Centre for Diversity Studies, University of the Witwatersrand) Understanding Informal Segregation: Racial and Spatial Identities among the Indian Minority of Mokopane 37 by Sahba Besharati (University of Cape Town and King’s College London) and Don Foster (University of Cape Town) A Disgraced Whiteness: Tactics Used to Deny Racism, Reduce Stigma, and Elicit Sympathy 53 by Suntosh R. Pillay (Department of Health, Durban) and Kevin Durrheim (University of KwaZulu-Natal) Open forum Multiculturalism or Hybridisation? Cultural Mixing and Politics 67 by Paolo Gomarasca (Catholic University of the Sacred Heart of Milan) How Does the Construction of New Families Impact Remittances? 81 by Robin A. Harper (York College, City University of New York) and Hani Zubida (The Max Stern Yezreel Valley College, Department of Political Science) An online journal published by An & MPI MMG UNESCO DIVERSITIES mpimmg United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization MAX PLANCK SOCIETY Publication Director: Golda EL-KHoury Editor: Marian BurchardT Guest Editors: Richard BALLARD and Melissa STEYN Layout and Design: Birgitt SiPPEL Past issues in 2008-2013: “Female Migration Outcomes II”, Vol. 15, No. 1, 2013 “Language and Superdiversities II”, Vol. 14, No. 2, 2012 “Skilled Migration and the Brain Drain”, Vol. 14, No. 1, 2012 “Language and Superdiversities”, Vol. 13, No. 2, 2011 “Female Migration Outcomes: Human Rights Perspectives”, Vol. 13, No. 1, 2011 “Depicting Diversities”, Vol. 12, No. 1, 2010 “Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals”, Vol. 11, No. 2, 2009 “The Human Rights of Migrants”, Vol. 11, No. 1, 2009 “The Conditions of Modern Return Migrants”, Vol. 10, No. 2, 2008 “Citizenship Tests in a Post-National Era”, Vol. 10, No. 1, 2008 © UNESCo (2014) iSSN 2079-6595 Published jointly by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural organization 7, place de Fontenoy, 75352 Paris 07 SP, France and Max Planck institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity Hermann-Föge-Weg 11 D-37073 Göttingen, Germany Disclaimer: The designations employed and the presentation of material throughout this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of UNESCo concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The authors are responsible for the choice and the presentation of the facts contained in this Journal and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of UNESCo and do not commit the organization. Available online at www.mmg.mpg.de/diversities and www.unesco.org/shs/diversities Diversity and Small Town Spaces in Post-Apartheid South Africa: An introduction By Melissa Steyn (University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa) and Richard Ballard (University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa) ‘We may now use the term “spatiality” to capture by politics and ideology, and implicated in both the ways in which the social and the spatial are in- articulating and hiding this imbrication (Keith and extricably realised one in the other’ (Keith and Pile, Pile, 1993). This was certainly true of apartheid 1993, p. 6). South Africa, which sought to establish “group South Africa represents an international site of areas” and “homeland” arrangements that were interest on issues of reconciliation and trans- presented as aspirational processes of “sepa- formation within a historical context of ethnic rate development”. one of the ways in which hostility, racial segregation and dire mismanage- such ideological manoeuvres become bedded ment of diversity. Since 1994, the old apartheid down is through the formation of a moral order. political structures including national govern- Mbembe (2004) has argued that apartheid in ment, provincial government and local govern- South Africa tried to establish a particular moral ment have been reformed and numerous laws order through spatial arrangements, the physical have been enacted to redress past injustices and distance between races being largely understood to facilitate greater economic and social equity. to sanctify moral distances. With the 20 years of democracy being celebrated The spatial manifestations of what is consid- in 2014, this special edition of Diversities is per- ered right and wrong are evident in the arrange- tinent to the many questions that will be raised ments of neighbourhoods. it is when the social in taking stock of how far South Africa has come order is disrupted that this moral order, and in changing the dynamics of segregation, exclu- the cultural assumptions upon which it is based, sion and oppression that characterised the old becomes discernible (Stokoe and Wallwork, dispensation. in particular, the articles collected 2003). Thus Ballard (2004) shows in his research in this volume speak to spatiality in small town the discomfort of suburban white people to life as a specific dimension of sociality. emerging informal communities in Durban. The There is a rich body of literature that exam- “threat” these residents feel resides in increased ines the spatiality of human life, and the ways in proximity to those that were previously excluded which space is an active part of how our social from suburban spaces, a closeness experienced identities come to be constructed. As Foster as destabilising the established social and moral (2005, p. 498) puts it: ‘Space is highly significant order. for human interaction. [. ] Places have specific Given South Africa’s history, its enforced meanings for people; they resonate with sym- geographies of separation and subsequent pro- bolic and emotional significance. We all carry grammes aimed at reversing this legacy, it pro- with us senses of “place identity”.’ indeed, iden- vides a particularly rich site for social enquiry tity and space are not only intimately linked but within the framework of spatiality.i n South Africa actively constitute each other. as elsewhere, much of the emerging literature in its operations of shaping social orders, the on space, identity and the social order points to spatiality of life is not “innocent”. it is deeply a deeply ethnicised and racialised organisation inscribed within relations of power, permeated of space. in those places where actual physical DIVERSITIES Vol. 15, No. 2, 2013 ISSN 2079-6595, www.unesco.org/shs/diversities/vol15/issue1/art1 © UNESCO DIVERSITIES Vol. 15, No. 2, 2013 • ISSN 2079-6595 M. Steyn, R. Ballard proximity has developed between racial group- Cape Town. This work reflects a mixed record in ings since the inception of democracy in South terms of the transformation of identities and the Africa in 1994, it has not necessarily resulted interaction of people and spaces. it is clear that in social proximity. Although this lack of social the demise of formal measures of racial segre- integration is cloaked in numerous guises such gation previously enforced by apartheid has not as property price, crime, disease, culture and resulted in an unproblematically integrated and spoiling of the natural environment (Saff, 1996a, egalitarian society. South Africa remains a deeply 2001b; Steyn, 2004; Steyn and Foster 2008) the divided society, and even as the fault lines shift single most important underlying theme identi- and reconfigure, some scholars argue that ‘the fied in the literature is race. in his work on squat- spatial distribution of housing and communities ter communities in Cape Town, Saff (2001, p. 87) in cities and towns, remains relatively unchanged explores how “race neutral” objections to squat- other than in limited areas’ (Foster, 2005, p. 494). ter communities serve to “camouflage racial Christopher (2005, p. 2305) observes that ‘the prejudice”. in their work on perceptions of infor- post-apartheid city continues to look remarkably mal street traders in relation to white middle like its predecessor, the apartheid city’. suburban communities in Durban, Popke and Countering the trend which has seen research Ballard (2004) also explore the way in which rac- on transformation in South Africa mostly ist meaning is disguised in metaphor. The result focussed on life in urban areas, the research of these discursive strains is the entrenchment programme that led the articles in this special and persistence of racially organized residential edition1 sought to investigate transformation, patterns. Dixon and Durrheim (2003), reveal- especially as it relates to spatiality, in rural towns ing the racialised flows of people on beaches in in South Africa. With a few exceptions, such as Kwa Zulu-Natal, yet again emphasise how these Donaldson and Marais (2012), rural areas have racially segregationist dynamics are informed by not received the same attention as cities. Apart a moral foundation that justifies the place of dif- from the simple fact of the concentration
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