As Long as They Don’t Bury Me Here. Social Relations of Poverty in a Namibian Shantytown

An increasing number of poor Southern Africans live in poverty-stricken urban slums or shantytowns. Focusing on four shantytowns in the northern Namibian town of Oshakati, Inge Tvedten’s book analyses the coping strategies of the poorest sections of such populations. The study by the Norwegian anthropologist is based on fieldwork conducted intermittently during a period of ten years. It combines theories of political, economic and cultural structuration, and of the material and cultural basis for social relations of inclusion and exclusion as practise.