The article examines assumptions circulating in development or interventionist
discourse concerning the vulnerabilities of AIDS orphans in South Africa. Ongoing
ethnographic research, begun in March 2003, with 31 rural children and youth between
the ages of 14 and 22, in Magangangozi, KwaZulu-Natal, points to the ways in which
global terms may fail to describe local particularities. Too narrow a focus on the
vulnerabilities of AIDS orphans obscures the ways in which they share similar
circumstances with other poor children, as well as the strengths they bring to bear
on their circumstances. Research methods include: documenting meetings between the
children and NGO intervention facilitators; ongoing home visits; the use of
open-ended recorded interviews and of theatre techniques; accompanying children in
household and agricultural tasks; and facilitating group workshops with the young
people outside their community. Findings show the varying circumstances in which the
‘orphans’ live; the degrees to which they have been accommodated
within wider kin groups; their dexterity, knowledge and skill in navigating local
environments; and a reiteration of rich sets of cultural understandings and local
performance repertoires in holding experience and loss. Some of the implicit
meanings in children's rights discourse as filtered through interventionist
programmes aimed at AIDS orphans, namely, what it is to be a child, and the social
placement of children in relation to caregivers, are thus challenged.
Amit-Talai
,
Vered
and
Helena Wulff
(eds) (1995) Youth Cultures: A Cross-Cultural
Perspective..
London: Routledge
.
2.
Aspaas, H.
(1999)
‘AIDS Orphans in Uganda: Geographical and Gender Interpretations
of Household Resources’
, Social Science Journal36 (2):
201–226
.
3.
Barnett, T.
and
A. Whiteside
(2002) AIDS in the Twenty-First Century Disease and
Globalization..
Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
.
4.
Basaza, R.
and
K. Kaija
(2002) ‘The Impact of HIV/AIDS on Children:
Lights and Shadows in the “Successful Case” of
Uganda’, in
G. Cornia
(ed.) AIDS, Public Policy and Child Well-Being., pp.
1–73.
Florence: UNICEF-IRC
.
5.
Bettelheim, Bruno
(1978) The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of
Fairy Tales..
London: Penguin
.
6.
Bray, Rachel
(2003) Predictions the Social Consequences of Orphanhood in
South Africa., Working Paper No. 29.
Cape Town: Centre for Social Science Research,
University of Cape Town
.
7.
Cairns
, Ed (1996) Children and Political Violence: Understanding
Children's Worlds..
London: Blackwell
.
8.
Coles, Robert
(1986) The Political Lives of Children..
Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin
.
9.
Connolly, M.
and
J. Ennew
(1996)
‘Introduction: Children Out of Place’
, Childhood3 (2):
131–145
.
10.
Coombe, Carol
(2000) ‘Keeping the Education System Healthy:
Managing the Impact of HIV/AIDS on Education in South
Africa’, Current Issues in Education. (e-journal of
Teacher College Columbia).
11.
Daniel, M.
(2003)
‘Children without Parents in Botswana: The Safety Net and Beyond’
, paper presented at a Scientific Meeting on Empirical Evidence
for the Demographic and Socio-Economic Impact of AIDS, Health
Economic and HIV/AIDS/Research Division (HEARD), University of Natal Durban,
South Africa, 26–28 March.
12.
Das, Veena
and
Pamela Reynolds
(2003)
‘The Child on the Wing: Children Negotiating the Everyday in the
Geography of Violence’
, opening paper for Workshop One of a project under the
Rockefeller Foundation Resident Fellowships in the Humanities and the Study of
Culture Program at Johns Hopkins University2003–6, 15 November.
13.
De Boeck, Filip
(1998) ‘Beyond the Grave: History, Memory and
Death in Postcolonial Congo/Zaire’, in
Richard Werbner
(ed.) Memory and the Post Colony: African Anthropology and the Critique
of Power., pp. 21–57.
London: Zed Books
.
14.
De Boeck, Filip
and
Alcinda Honwana
(eds) (2004) Makers and Breakers, Made and Broken: Children
and Youngsters as Emerging Categories in Postcolonial Africa..
London: James Currey
.
15.
Dent, G.R.
and
C.L.S. Nyembezi
(1969) Scholar's Zulu Dictionary:
English–Zulu, Zulu–English.
Pietermaritzburg. Shuter and Shooter
.
16.
Dorrington, R.
,
D. Bradshaw
and
D. Budlender
(2002) HIV/AIDS Profile of the Provinces of South Africa:
Indicators for 2002.
Pretoria: Research Council and Actuarial
Society of South Africa
.
17.
Dowling, Tessa (1988) ‘Isihlonipho Sabafazi –The Xhosa
Women's Language of Respect’, MA thesis, University of Cape Town.
18.
Dowling, Tessa (2004) ‘uQedisizwe the Finisher of the
Nation: Naming and Talking about HIV/AIDS in African Languages?’, unpublished.
19.
Drew, R.
,
G. Foster
and
J. Chitima
(1996)
‘Cultural Practices of Orphaned Families in the North Nyanga
District of Zimbabwe’
, Journal of Social Development in Africa11:
79–86
.
20.
Ennew, Judith
(1994) ‘Parentless Friends: A Cross-Cultural
Examination of Networks amongst Street Children and Youth’,
in
F. Nestmann
and
K. Hurrelmann
(eds) Social Networks and Social Support in Childhood and
Adolescence., pp. 409–426.
Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter
.
21.
Ennew, Judith
(2001)
‘Dead Parents or Absent Parents: Who is Defining Orphans in the
Twenty-First Century? Some Reflections on Policies for Orphans in
Sub-Saharan Africa and South East Asia’
, notes towards a presentation at the Conference on
‘Orphans and Vulnerable Children in Africa’,
University of Uppsala, 13–16 September.
22.
Findlayson, R.
(1995) ‘Women's Language of Respect:
isihlonipho sabafazi’, in
R. Mesthrie
(ed.) Language and Social History., pp.
140–153.
Cape Town: David Philip
.
23.
Giese, S.
,
H. Meintjes
,
R. Croke
and
R. Chamberlain
(2003) Health and Social Services to Address the Needs of
Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children in the Context of HIV/AIDS: Research
Report and Recommendations., Report submitted to HIV/AIDS directorate,
National Departments of Health, January 2003.
Cape Town: Children's Institute,
University of Cape Town
.
24.
Goldman, L.R.
(1998) Child's Play: Myth Mimesis and Make
Believe..
Oxford: Berg
.
25.
Henderson, Patricia (1999) ‘Living with Fragility: Children in New
Crossroads’, doctoral thesis, University of Cape Town.
26.
Henderson, Patricia
(2003) ‘Questions on Fostering: An
Anthropological Perspective’, in
S. Burman
(ed.) The Fate of the Child: Legal Decision Making in South
Africa., pp. 9–31.
Cape Town: Juta
.
27.
Henderson, Patricia
(2005)
‘Mortality and the Ethics Qualitative Rural Research in the
Context of HIV/AIDS’
, Anthropology Southern Africa28 (3 and 4):
78–90
.
28.
Hunter, S.
(1990)
‘Orphans as a Window on the AIDS Epidemic in Sub-Saharan Africa:
Initial Results and Implications of a Study in Uganda’
, Social Science and Medicine31 (6):
681–690
.
29.
James, Alison
and
Alan Prout
(1990) Constructing and Reconstructing Childhood:
Contemporary Issues in Sociological Study of Childhood.
London: Falmer Press
.
30.
James, Allison
,
Chris Jenks
and
Alan Prout
(1998) Theorizing Childhood..
Cambridge: Polity Press
.
31.
Jones, Sean
(1993) Assaulting Childhood: Children's Experiences
of Migrancy and Hostel Life in South Africa..
Johannesburg: Witwatersrand University Press
.
32.
Marcus, Tessa
(1999) Wo! Zaphela Izingane – It is Destroying the
Children – Living and Dying with AIDS, report prepared for the
Children in Distress Network (CINDI).
Pietermaritzburg: CINDI
.
33.
Meintjes, Helen
(2004)
‘Spinning the Epidemic: The Making of Mythologies of Orphanhood
in the Context of AIDS... (Representing Orphanhood)’
, paper presented symposium ‘Life and Death in a Time of
AIDS: The Southern African Experience’ WITS Institute of Economic and
Social Research (WISER), University of the Witwatersrand and
CRESP, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, University of
Paris, 14–16 October.
34.
Mncube, F. (1949) ‘Hlonipha Language as Found among the
Zulu-Xhosa Women’, MA thesis, University of the Witwatersrand.
35.
Ndebele, Njabulo
(1995) ‘Recovering Childhood: Children in South
African National Reconstruction’, in
S. Stephens
(ed.) Children and the Politics of Culture., pp.
321–333.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
.
36.
Nieuwenhuys, Olga
(1994) Children's Lifeworlds: Gender, Welfare and
Labour in the Developing World..
London: Routledge
.
37.
Okri, Ben
(1991) The Famished Road..
Cape Town: David Philip
.
38.
Opie, I.
and
P. Opie
(1969) Children's Games in Street and
Playground..
Oxford: Oxford University Press
.
39.
Opie, I.
and
Opie, P.
(1977) The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
.(Orig. pub. 1959.)
40.
Ramphele, Mamphele
(2002) Steering by the Stars: Being Young in South
Africa..
Cape Town: Tafelberg Publishers
.
41.
Reynolds, Pamela
(1987) Dance Civet Cat: Child Labour in the Zambezi Valley..London: Zed Books
.
42.
Reynolds, Pamela
(1995a)
‘ “Not Known Because not Looked for”:
Ethnographers Listening to the Young in Southern Africa’
, Ethnos60 (3–4):
193–221
.
43.
Reynolds, Pamela
(1995b) ‘Youth and Politics of Culture in South
Africa’, in
S. Stephens
(ed.) Children and the Politics of Culture., pp.
218–240.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
.
44.
Reynolds, Pamela
(2000) ‘The Ground of All Making: State
Violence, the Family and Political Activists’, in
V. Das
et al. (eds) Violence and Subjectivity, pp.
141–170.
Berkeley. University of California Press
.
45.
Ross, Fiona
(1995) Houses Without Doors: Diffusing Domesticity in Die
Bos.
Pretoria: The Human Sciences Research Council
(HSRC). Cooperative Research Programme on Marriage and Family Life
.
46.
Schonteich, M.
(1999)
‘AIDS and Age: South Africa's Crime Time Bomb’
, AIDS Analyis Africa10 (2):
1–4
.
47.
Schonteich, M.
(2001)
‘A Generation at Risk: AIDS Orphans, Vulnerable Children and
Human Security in Africa’
, paper presented at conference on Orphans and Vulnerable Children
in Africa. Nordic Africa Institute, September.
48.
Seekings, Jeremy
(1995)
‘Media Representations of Youth in the South African Transition, 1989–1994’
, South African Sociological Review7 (2):
25–42
.
49.
Seekings, Jeremy
(1996)
‘ “The Lost Generation”: South
Africa's Youth “Problem” in the Early 1990s’
, Transformation29:
103–125
.
50.
Scheper-Hughes
,
Nancy
and
Carolyn Sargent
(eds) (1998) Small Wars: The Cultural Politics of
Childhood., pp. 1–33.
Berkeley: University of California Press
.
51.
Stephens, Sharon
(ed.) (1995) Children and the Politics of Culture.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
.
52.
UNAIDS
(2004) 2004 Report on the Global AIDS Epidemic: 4th Global
Report..
Geneva: UNAIDS
.
53.
UNICEF
(2003) Africa's Orphaned Generations..
New York: UNICEF
.
