Double Borderland Identities: A Case study of Musina Local Municipality

SCIS Seminar

About the speaker: 

Chido Muzanenhamo is a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Wits School of Architecture and Planning. She obtained her PhD in Urban Planning from the University of the Witwatersrand. With a background in the Social Sciences, her research interests include Gender Studies, African Urbanism, Transnationalism, Labour in the Global Economy, with a special emphasis on the informal economy and informal space. Chido has worked as a research intern at the Foundation for Human Rights (FHR), where she contributed to the research study on the State of Intolerance with respect to the National Action Plan (NAP) to combat Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance for the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development.

Abstract: 

The seminar will present an article arguing that Musina Municipality is a double borderland by being both transnational and rural–urban. It suggests that not only cross-border activities and permeating social boundaries characterise the municipality’s transnational interface, but also that nuanced understandings of nationality and citizenship contribute to social actions and attitudes that inform ideas of “us” versus “them” in the borderland community. Furthermore, the rural–urban interface is characterised by phenomenological understandings of the rural–urban divide, together with the socio-spatial changes taking place within the municipality. Although this appears to be discordant, it illustrates the importance of the transnational borderland identity in shaping and shifting these ideas. The article concludes by suggesting Musina residents experience a double-borderland identity and that their ideas on how black women should construct and perform their gender identities provide a buffer against the antagonisms that emerge daily from life in the borderlands.

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