An alien in the country of my birth: xenophobia reinforcing otherness and promoting exclusion
SOURCE: Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity
OUTPUT TYPE: Journal Article
PUBLICATION YEAR: 2016
TITLE AUTHOR(S): M.Chandia, T.G.B.Hart
KEYWORDS: CITIZENSHIP, SOCIAL INCLUSION, XENOPHOBIA
Print: HSRC Library: shelf number 9334
HANDLE: 20.500.11910/9981
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11910/9981
OUTPUT TYPE: Journal Article
PUBLICATION YEAR: 2016
TITLE AUTHOR(S): M.Chandia, T.G.B.Hart
KEYWORDS: CITIZENSHIP, SOCIAL INCLUSION, XENOPHOBIA
Print: HSRC Library: shelf number 9334
HANDLE: 20.500.11910/9981
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11910/9981
If you would like to obtain a copy of this Research Output, please contact Hanlie Baudin at researchoutputs@hsrc.ac.za.
Abstract
In South Africa xenophobia conjures up gruesome images of the 2008 and 2015 attacks. Physically violent attacks appear to make local and international headline news. But xenophobia is not simply about nationals and non nationals, nor does it only occur as irregular violent outbreaks. Such portrayals obscure other far more widely lived experiences of xenophobia, which largely appear as a means of reinforcing otherness with the purpose of excluding such others from the benefits of citizenship or residence in South Africa. To understand this it is necessary to explore South Africa's xenophobic past, which has to do with continual struggles for limited resources. These struggles have not been effectively overturned by the removal of discriminatory apartheid legislation and the introduction of South Africa's Constitution. Our argument is based on author Margaret's experiences as a South African child born of middle-class immigrant parents, which are anchored in the broader political and social context of South Africa. These experiences produce the very real fear of being denied the Constitutional rights of a South African citizen or resident. Such fears are also experienced by South African citizens 'proper', and we include some evidence of this when it comes to interaction with naturalisation and police authorities, as well as what it means with regard to employment. While we have achieved a democracy, the next step is to move out of single-minded racial and ethnic silos to achieve a cosmopolitan democracy as envisaged in the constitution.-
Related Research Outputs:
- Citizenship, violence and xenophobia in South Africa: perceptions from South African communities
- Comment: 'Fortress SA'?: a response to John Sharp
- Citizenship, violence and xenophobia in South Africa: perceptions from South African communities
- Migration, citizenship and South African history textbooks
- Immigration policies that include or exclude: a South African public opinion study of immigration policy preferences
- South Africa: the struggle for social justice and citizenship in South African education
- Are South Africans xenophobic?: migration policies need to support integration
- Xenophobia in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic: how the pandemic increases zero-sum bias about foreign nationals
- Globalisation, identity and national policy in South Africa
- Global citizenship, cultural citizenship and world religions in religion education
- Globalization issues of identity and the implications for governance and democratization in the post-apartheid South Africa
- 'Functional' & 'dysfunctional' communities: the making of ethical citizens
- Makwerekwere: citizenship, nationhood and identity among Zimbabweans in South Africa
- Migration, xenophobia and South African history textbooks
- Breaking the cycle of violent crime
- Horizon scanning in South Africa: crime and violence: governance, citizenship and social cohesion
- Racial redress & citizenship in South Africa
- Affirmative action and cosmopolitan citizenship in South Africa
- Rapid appraisal of social inclusion policies in selected sub-Saharan African countries
- Xenophobia and school history textbooks