Ritualistic urbanism: habitualism, mutualism and multinational coexistence in Johannesburg

Katsaura, Obvious

doi:10.1080/14725843.2017.1366295

Cited by 1 publication

(9 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…This ethnographic moment was particularly resonant because it occurred just one hour after Mr Abdo, a middle-aged Sudanese man who works as a street vendor in town, described a strikingly similar kind of experience. Mr Abdo uses isiZulu greetings to capture the attention of people who pass his stall, a capacity that many migrant groups in South Africa develop as a means of navigating social encounters (Katsaura 2018: 9). Mr Abdo observed that black South Africans routinely use these business transactions as an opportunity to humiliate him for his limited language comprehension; they often continue to speak at him in isiZulu even when they have gathered that he does not know the language.…”

Section: Unwelcoming Gesturesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Beyond humiliation and intimidation, some migrants also indicated that these encounters are used as a vehicle for extorting money out of them (see also Katsaura 2018: 9). One of our Tanzanian interlocutors, Ally, gave a good example of these dynamics: We [migrants] experience intimidation every day, even when using public transport.…”

Section: Unwelcoming Gesturesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Islamic greetings, then, provide a legitimate platform for generating and projecting a sense of mutual recognition and respect that, given Durban's gestural politics, would otherwise be impossible using isiZulu or other languages. This is particularly important for Rashidi and his friends, who, as retailers, are regularly exposed to dynamics of ‘misrecognition’ in their business transactions when ‘locals’ discredit the ‘assimilated’ selves that they perform (Katsaura 2018: 6). Given that, as Rashidi explained, migrant business operators are unable to retaliate when they feel intimidated or humiliated by ‘locals’, let alone openly resist such behaviour, these forms of mutuality and alignment transform the urban everyday into a site of not only exclusion but also tacit resistance (Mottiar 2019: 288).…”

Section: ‘Islam Is Our Basics’mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…More specifically, the mosque presents ‘a way to stay alongside’ black South Africans because it is a space in which Muslim migrants do not need to negotiate, justify or defend their presence as they do elsewhere in the CBD. As in the case of Katsaura's (2018: 12) Pentecostal church in Johannesburg, the performance of obligatory prayer provides routine opportunities for ethnically diverse residents to enter one another's presence ‘at the intersection of intimacy and strangeness’: a space where the mundane rituals of social encounter (such as the exchange of greetings) are upheld and, accordingly, moments of mutuality are generated. The ‘hope’ that accompanies the suggestion that Muslim migrants ‘do business in town’ derives once again from a sense of welcome – an invitation to cohabit and fully participate in an urban everyday associated with the established Indian South African community.…”

Section: A Sense Of Welcomementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Goffman (1971: 75, 78) conceptualizes greetings as 'rituals' through which participants not only become more 'accessible' for heightened interaction, but also extend 'social recognition' to one another. Given that such moments of recognition exchange are constitutive of the 'ethno-national mutualism' that Katsaura (2018) identifies within the urban everyday, we find greeting practices to be particularly fruitful to 'think with' here.…”

Section: Weaponizing the Everydaymentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Disarming the xenophobic everyday: Muslim migrants and the horizons of urban mutuality in Durban

Kirby¹,

Sibanda²,

Charway³

2021

Africa

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This article explores the everyday lives that African migrants in Durban, South Africa share with other residents of the city. In conversation with Obvious Katsaura's work on ‘ethno-mutualism’, we use the example of ordinary greeting practices to show how Durban's urban everyday has been hijacked by xenophobic sensibilities. By demonstrating how the act of excluding migrants from these practices threatens to render the quotidian city uninhabitable for them, we shed light on the importance of mundane forms of social interaction for building a sense of identity and belonging. We then consider several ways in which African migrants develop and participate in Muslim forms of sociality that assist them in ‘disarming’ the urban everyday: from providing a platform for building solidarity with fellow migrants to mediating a ‘sense of welcome’ from the established Indian South African community. Elaborating on this, we delineate how forms of reciprocity emerge through the interactions between migrant and Indian Muslims that reproduce the ambient life of the city as a shared habitat, opening up new possibilities for entanglement. As such, our analysis contributes to emerging conversations about urban mutuality and migrant religious practices in the everyday lives of African cities.

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Section: Unwelcoming Gesturesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Unwelcoming Gesturesmentioning

confidence: 99%