Abstract
While the dominant understanding on the relationship between African migrants and local South Africans is framed around xenophobia, migrants are not always victims, rather they engage in socio-economic relations with the local people. We assert that African migrants do have agency to act and think beyond xenophobia. In this chapter, we examine how different spaces provides a vantage point for such migrant-locals socialities. Thus, this chapter focuses on how both local South Africans and migrants find ways of living together without necessarily resorting to violence. This chapter is based on the ethnography of being in particular places of interaction in the everyday lives of migrants.
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Rosette Sifa Vuninga’s contribution is extracted from her PhD research. She therefore acknowledges the National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, in collaboration with the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa, the University of the Western Cape’s Centre for Humanities (CHR)’s Andrew W. Mellon Flagship Doctoral Fellowship, and to the Social Science Research Council’s Next Generation Social Sciences in Africa: Doctoral Dissertation Completion Fellowship whom so far have funded her PhD programme.
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Maringira, G., Vuninga, R.S. (2022). Beyond Xenophobia: Migrants-Locals in Socio-Economic Spaces in Cape Town, South Africa. In: Isike, C., Isike, E.M. (eds) Conflict and Concord. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1033-3_8
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