Abstract:
Post-apartheid South Africa is characterized by growing
feelings of pain, anger and frustration amongst black
communities triggered by pervasive social inequalities. This
has given birth to a new form of political and social activism
shaped by crude violence, vandalism, destruction, brutal killings
of women and children as well as thuggery in different
black communities. It has also led to an upsurge in violence
particularly on Africans from other parts of the continent. In
this article, I attempt to examine how racial politics and resilient
white privilege intersect to trigger afrophobic violence in
South Africa. I draw on existing literature on broad conceptions
of race and xenophobia to make a set of assertions
about racial valuations, the resilience of white supremacy
and black on black violence. In the article, I argue that black
South Africans' pain, anger and the performance of violence on African migrants are on one level a consequence of resilient
structural racism and racial practices, which continue to
marginalize, emasculate and dispossess blacks. These racial
practices force black South Africans to look elsewhere to
express their anger, pains and frustrations.
