Space, society and culture: housing and local level politics in a section of Alexandra township, 1991-1992
Date
1995
Authors
Lucas, Justine, Clare
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
This thesis presents an analysis of the relationship between social processes, cognitive
understandings and the organisation of space, as this pertains to local-level politics
in a section of Alexandra township, South Africa, during 1991 and 1992. The context
of the thesis is the attempts by the Alexandra Civic Organisation and the Alexandra
branch of the African National Congress to elicit support from people living in formal
and inform~i housing during a period of intense violence. The focus of the
ethnographylis on local-level civic structures and political leadership, which in some
ways support and in others contradict the aims and objectives of these two
organisations.
The reason for this internal political diversity is that local-level politics is embedded
within social maps - cognitive orderings of space that represent patterns of social
relations and structures of power. This points to the main theoretical focus of the
thesis: the interrelationship of space, culture and society in an urban context.
Urbanism is conventionally defined in sociological and geographical terms as the
articulation between social process and urban spatial form. The thesis shows how
anthropology can make a contribution to this field of study by incorporating a concern
with culture. The mutually constitutive relationship of urban space, culture and
society presents a way of looking at urbanism that does not depend on a rural-urban
dichotomy; a social. and cultural dualism which is conventionally fitted into a
modernist narrative of urbanisation. The ethnography in the thesis demonstrates the
inapplicability of this narrative, and the categories of rural tradition and urban
modernity which it implies.
Keywords: anthropology, urbanism, urbanisation, rural-urban dichotomy,
space, Alexandra, politics, civic organisation, informal housing.
Description
A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Arts,
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg,
in fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of Master of Arts, 1995
Keywords
Housing policy -- South Africa, Alexandra (Johannesburg, South Africa) -- Social conditions, Squatter settlements -- South Africa -- Johannesburg
Citation
Lucas, Justine Clare (1995) Space, society and culture: housing and local level politics in a section of Alexandra township, 1991-1992, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg,<http://hdl.handle.net/10539/23394>