Apartheid Vertigo (Interdisciplinary Research Series in Ethnic, Gender and Class Relations)

Apartheid Vertigo, the dizzying sensation following prolonged oppression and delusions of skin colour, is the focus of this book. For three centuries, the colour-code shaped the state and national ideals of South Africa, created social and emotional distances between social groups, permeated public and intimate spheres of life alike, and dehumanized Africans of all nationalities in South Africa. Two decades after the demise of apartheid, despite four successive black governments, apartheid vertigo still distorts postcolonial reality. The colour-code, notably the aversion toward Africa and blackness, still prevails, but now in postcolonial masks. Despite political freedom, to a greater or lesser extent, black citizenry has adopted the code, and adapted it to fit the new reality. This vertiginous reality is manifest in the neo-apartheid ideology of Makwerekwere - the postcolonial colour-code mobilized to distinguish black outsiders from black insiders. Apartheid vertigo ranges from negative sentiments to outright violence against black outsiders, including insults, humiliations, extortions, searches, arrests, detentions, deportations, tortures, rapes, beatings, and killings. Ironically, the victims are not only the outsiders against whom the code is mobilized but also the insiders who mobilize it. Drawing on evidence from interviews, observation, press articles, reports, research monographs and history, this project deconstructs the idea of visible differences between black nationals and black foreign nationals. It demonstrates that in South Africa violent conflict lurks on the surface of everyday life and it can burst through the fragile limits set upon it, with the potential to escalate into ethnic cleansing.