racial inequality – GW Blogs from Abroad

People Here Are Afraid Of Everything

AdminNovember 19, 2014December 17, 2018

The title seems broad, but months pondering this subject and I’m yet to come up with a better summarization of my feelings. White people here, are indeed, afraid of everything and everyone…it seems at least.

Stellenbosch is located in the Western Cape. It is 17% white, 49% coloured, and 33% black African. But I’m going to be perfectly honest. Despite my returning to the United States and everyone imagining that I spent my days surrounded by “black Africans”, I spend my days in Stellenbosch almost entirely interacting with whites and maybe, coloured people. Stellenbosch is an Afrikaans university, which is why it attracts that demographic. In fact, despite the Western Cape being 17% white, the most of any region in South Africa, Stellenbosch University is 68.5% white.

So great, we’ve established there isn’t much diversity here. But that’s not really my issue, as whether I’m here or at a small liberal arts college in the United States, I will probably find myself disappointed by the sea of white privilege—myself being a part of that. What I’m disappointed about is the connection it has taught me here between race, income and safety.

Last semester we experienced two girls, on their own during dark hours, individually get kidnapped on campus. It shook the campus. Suddenly students were saying there was a “crime spike”. Every kid who had his wallet stolen or was approached by someone weird contributed to this theory. Emails were sent out explaining the situation to parents, and to avoid another “incident”, evening exams offered bus trips for kids to and from the exam venue. I later received an email from the University president that “crime had been pushed to perimeters of campus”.

And I stood there, and I wondered what that meant. Crime had been “pushed” off campus? There was always crime in Stellenbosch. The kidnappings had just made people more aware of it. And there are reasons for that. Despite the university being, predominantly wealthy and white, the town of Stellenbosch itself is not. In fact, Stellenbosch is actually vastly majority coloured and there is a huge township, Kayamandi, viewable from basically every window at this university. Within a 5 minute walk from campus, you can find yourself in a very different world. Forget the tree lined streets and cute cafes, bring in the discounted expired-goods grocery stores and beggars on the streets.

As such, its not so surprising to me that Stellenbosch University would be a target for crime. Kids here have grown up in literal bubbles of gated communities which within themselves have 8 foot walls and security systems. They went to private all-boys and all-girls schools where they receive a world class education while other students in their country can’t afford books or even a school lunch. They walk around campus with I-Phones in hand and newly bought clothes. This is all not so different from my university at home. But what I’m saying is that the blatant display of class difference here would piss me off as someone not part of that social class, too. Though kidnapping is certainly extreme, for a large amount of robberies or theft to go on here is unsurprising to me, as from the outside it looks like these kids have everything- and could certainly live past losing a laptop or a sandwich.

It is also shocking to me that the university would promote its students to stay indoors during evening hours, to bus to and from exams, and to never walk alone. Perhaps living in DC has given me a thick skin, in which they text us to tell us of crime but don’t necessary guide us of what to do- instead assuming us mature enough to react on our own. I feel like promoting these things only keeps these already naive students in their bubble. Hiding from crime does not make it go away and these same students will one day be entering into the real world where crime still happens, and be equally as uneducated of how to handle it.

But that is one more caveat. I totally understand why the kidnappings shook this campus. That just doesn’t happen here and is incredibly unfortunate. However, aside from that students are convinced that Stellenbosch is incredibly dangerous. As they spread this message, as do professors and university officials, a general fear becomes ingrained in students. For example, I had a study partner tell me that she previously lived on another side of Stellenbosch and moved because she felt “unsafe”. I asked her why and what had happened. She told me that nothing ever happened, she just felt it. I asked her if there were more black people around her previous residence, and she explained yes. I’m not sure she caught my connection between the two. Students come to fear the outside world as if its going to eat them alive. It also creates an unnecessary fear of anyone who’s not a clean-cut kid. I was walking with a friend once who saw a black man carrying a chair down the road ahead of us. She instantly grabbed my arm and told me that we should stay away from him because he “looked dangerous”. I, naturally, laughed and asked how carrying a chair makes someone scary. I then explained that if it was a white person carrying that chair, they would assume it was just a student moving or doing something stupid. Suddenly it’s a black guy and you are in danger of the man-with-chair. It’s actually ridiculous.

I am yet to feel unsafe at all in Stellenbosch, any more than I am in DC. I feel that if you look like you know where you are going, what you are doing, and look people in the eyes you are doing yourself the largest favor. I’ve walked at all times of day and night, alone, and have rarely been approached. When I have, I have acted calm and nothing has happened to me. I think that by the time you are in college you should not be hand-holded of how to function day-to-day and unfortunately dealing with crime is part of that here. And even if crime, predominantly theft, does happen, can you really blame them?

Homestay in the township

AdminNovember 5, 2014December 14, 2018

By clairemac93

It’s one of those things you see on CNN, or in movies, or you read about. The trash- laying on street corners or buried under dirt after long months of no attention. The animals- feral dogs with mange and bad tempers, no collars or owners in sight. The homes- tin roofed, brightly colored, but ultimately threadbare.

I’m speaking of the townships.

South Africa is probably one of three countries I would associate with the word “township”- the other two being Brazil and India. However, countries everywhere from Pakistan (largest township in the world) to Jamaica and Bangladesh consider townships inevitable parts of society. Not surprisingly, the countries containing townships- most of them considered middle income countries, also have very high Gini coefficients [Gini Coefficient=mathematical measurement of inequality in society], with South Africa in fact having the highest measure of inequality in the world.

On the one hand, movies like Slumdog Millionaire and events such as the World Cup have made the general public more aware of the existence of townships/shantytowns/favelas and have put a face to those who live there. On the other hand, flying into Cape Town in January I was still mentally unprepared to see these townships stretch for miles, with planes landing only yards from shacks outside the airport gates. On my initial ride through the city, where major monuments and parts of the city were pointed out to me, it was not lost on me that not a word was spoken about the miles of townships we were passing. Perhaps our tour guide thought they spoke for themselves.

Townships are a lot more nuanced than a quick overlook might make them out to be. Densely populated and located in many different areas of cities or the country, townships hold far from homogenous groups of people. Everything from income level, to language, to religion, to employment status is different from area to area and home to home. Walking down the street you may find a shack that is hardly standing, with a cardboard roof and no running water, next to a house which rivals many comfortable single-story homes in the United States.

I stayed in a home in Gugulethu, a township about 15km outside of Cape Town. The township’s name means “our pride”, a very robust name considering its founding was due to Apartheid’s removal of blacks from Cape Town- thereby moving them to areas like Gugulethu. My host family consisted of my host father, Zukile, the right-hand man to the priest at the local church and his wife, Loretta, who works at the Department of Home Affairs. Because of the fact that both of them are employed, something perhaps not associated with those living in the Townships, their house is nicely furnished, with two bedrooms, and all the amenities of a normal South African home.

Besides the fact we were in a township, my time staying with their family gave me a very different cultural experience than what I would get in a place like Stellenbosch. The family was black and Xhosa-speaking, very spiritual, and focused on their extended and spiritual family. We went to church together on Sunday morning, and I got the chance to try what I would consider real South African home-cooked food. Never in my life have I eaten so much meat. My host family was full of warm hugs and curious questions, and I found myself envisioning what my year would be like if they were my full-time host family here in South Africa. Despite this, it was impossible to ignore some of the realities of living in the area. True to what I’d read, trash collection was not as efficient as other places and many families share latrines outside the home, which many times go uncared for and overflow. Alcoholism is a large issue, true in any disadvantaged community, as is HIV.

Going to church was my favourite part of the weekend. Acting as the social and cultural center of the township, the church itself can fit hundreds of believers and reverberates the sounds of worshipers singing for hours on end. From old ladies to little toddlers who can already pop-and-lock, there is rarely a moment when the room isn’t full of song and dance. The old ladies particularly liked to dance a move I called the “chugga chugga choo choo” which involved swinging their arms in a circular motion next to their hips. Though the service was conducted in isiXhosa and I myself am not believing, I couldn’t help but be spellbound by the joy emanating from those around me, and to see and feel how thankful they were for all that they did have in a world where many people can only think about what they don’t. The church itself has gotten a lot of praise as well as criticism for its acceptance of HIV/AIDS positive members and its promotion of inclusion of HIV positive residents. The HIV/AIDS awareness ribbon hangs proudly on the front podium of the church. After church, most of the youth head to a place called Mzoli’s- a place I would recommend any visitor to Cape Town go, especially on a Sunday. With large platters of meat and no shortage of music, Mzoli’s acts as a nice mix of locals and foreigners gathering in one big outdoor day-party in the middle of the township.

Returning home to Stellenbosch, I found myself much more motivated by my time spent in the township to push myself to find new and unique experiences like what I’d just encountered. However, I was also quickly reminded of the divide when I raved to an Afrikaaner classmate of my homestay over the weekend, and she quickly wrote me off by saying that she grew up here and would never take a step into the township. Another student chimed in in agreement. She, and others here, are missing out on a lot of warmth, culture, and critical discussion. It’s a shame that many of my fellow students here have not so much as taken the train into Cape Town, let alone gone into a township. This being said, I can see myself or my fellow students in the United States saying similar things about certain parts of Philadelphia, DC, or Detroit- where poverty and crime are high and most of us would avoid so much as driving into. I hope to come to terms with the similarities between the racial and economic biases in all the countries I’ve lived in someday, and hopefully be able to explain them more eloquently.

Living as a ‘Toubab’: Perceptions & Relations of Race in Senegal

AdminNovember 4, 2014December 14, 2018

By rosessupposes

One of the many attractions of studying abroad in Africa was the chance to experience life as a minority race. For the first time in my life, I’m living in a city where almost all the faces I pass are a different race than my own. When I look at the faces in the government, the same is true. Here in Dakar, I’m an anomaly, and I stick out.

That is an experience in itself. But the additional differences of how people relate to racial differences compared to the US are staggering. It is pointed out quite often that I’m a ‘toubab’, or a foreigner. According to my host father, this name comes from a word for ‘doctor’, referring to one of the first interactions the resident population had with the French. At one point it just referred to French expats, but it’s expanded to include all white foreigners. And yet, there is no malice in the label. It’s a statement of fact – I’m white, and look different. The same logic applies to students who are referred to as ‘chinois’ (used for anyone who appears to have East Asian ancestry), ‘arabe’ (not necessarily Arab, has included my friend of Indian heritage), or any other racial labels. The concept of having mixed-country racial identities seems to be difficult for folks here to grasp – the idea of ‘Indian-American’, ‘Chinese-American’, or ‘Mexican-American’ is very strange to a people who identify only with ‘Senegalese’, regardless of personal or family origin. Nevertheless, there remains no negative connotation to pointing out these differences in racial characteristics – it’s just a fact.

I had a long conversation about this with my host brother Papi about this. It was prompted by him asking about the events transpiring in Ferguson and St. Louis. With such a strong perception of America as a country of freedom and opportunity, he was completely baffled as to why there were American cops killing young black boys. And that’s a hard question, especially for me. While I have observed the continuing problem of racism in the US, and while I continuously try to educate myself on it, I will never have the intimate knowledge of a lived experience with it. But there are some elements that seem clear, especially in contrast with Dakar.

First and foremost – Papi knew, even as a non-American observer, that the conflict in Ferguson is inherently tied to racism and specifically anti-black racism. That fact is one that it seems a lot of white America has yet to fully grasp or accept. We can debate specific situational factors until the end of time, but the fact remains that there are too many instances of white cops shooting black young people, both young men and young women, who were unarmed and, by most all accounts, completely unthreatening at the time of their needless deaths. Even if it is not said in so many words, these white cops continue to feel ‘threatened’ by the very presence of these young black people, and their response continues to be immediate escalation of violence.

I believe that this may be the biggest visible factor that plays into the enduring racism in the US – no one in positions of power want to admit that race still heavily influences their judgment, and in a negative way. No one wants to be called or shown to be a ‘racist’, even if all their thoughts (and actions) align with such a label. But even more so, none of these folks at the top of the privilege totem pole want to talk about race, and the fact that different races exist, and the fact that there are still so many institutional factors at work against those who are not white. And a lot of this is self-protecting: to admit that there is an imbalance of privilege is to admit that you, as a white person, receive some form of unfair opportunity that others, as non-white people, do not. And this means that the leaders in the Ferguson area don’t think or don’t want to think about the disparity between percentage of white folks in the population compared to in positions of power, and in the police force. This means that this disparity has persisted for years and years, and needed just one more act of senseless violence against a young high school graduate to spark massive backlash against an unjust system.

It becomes clearer and clearer the more time I spend in Senegal how messed up the American way of dealing with race is. Here, there are many separate ethnic groups (Wolof, Poullar, and Serre, to name the biggest). They have different traditions and languages. They have very recognizable last names that belong to each group. It would be very easy for this to create tension or even violence between groups, if they purposefully ‘othered’ those who were not in their specific group. But instead, the opposite happens. They have a relationship called ‘joking cousins’ between specific groups and last names. When opposing groups meet and exchange family names, they’ll go off on stereotypes about that family – “oh, you’re a Dioup, I don’t want to eat dinner with you, you’ll be greedy!” or “Oh you’re a Ndiaye – haha, I own you! You have to obey me!” Any tension that could exist between the clearly divided in-groups and out-groups is smoothed over and eliminated by universal jokes that everyone knows are not personal, and are reciprocal. I fully believe that these animosities remain so calm because the differences are acknowledged as existing, and simultaneously acknowledged as inconsequential.

Being a minority race in Senegal definitely is a weird feeling, and at times can be scary. But yet, I know that it can never compare to the feeling of being a minority in the United States. I cannot purport to know how to magically solve the racism problem back home, and as a white person, it’s not my place to lead the discussion. But what I do know is that having that discussion is essential. Taking a page out of the Senegalese book, to acknowledge and discuss our racial differences, might just be a way to reach a similar level of comfort, humor, and nonviolent in the relations between races.