Abstract
This article is reading ubuntu in the light of homelessness in the cities and towns of South Africa. It suggests that ubuntu itself is homeless and displaced as a way of being human together. Instead of the mediation of dignity and justice through an ubuntu-solidarity, street homeless people and others living vulnerably and in precarious circumstances are violated and excluded through a displacement of ubuntu-values. It also suggests a growing disconnect between the philosophy of ubuntu and its actual embodiment in the local urban political economy, local faith communities and local universities. Acknowledging the aspirational edge of ubuntu, the article then concludes to envision going beyond mere abstractions in the said spheres � the political economy, faith communities and local universities � in order to seek for concrete expressions of ubuntu-solidarity, asserting and mediating respect, dignity and justice.
Highlights
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Acknowledging the aspirational edge of ubuntu, the article concludes to envision going beyond mere abstractions in the said spheres – the political economy, faith communities and local universities – in order to seek for concrete expressions of ubuntu-solidarity, asserting and mediating respect, dignity and justice
If we are to retain a vision of ubuntu, we need to first acknowledge that ubuntu, at least in urban South African contexts, seems to be homeless, in other words, displaced from the daily practices that deny ordinary people their humanness
Summary
Affiliation: 1Centre for Contextual Ministry, University of Pretoria, South Africa. Postal address: Centre for Contextual Ministry, University of Pretoria, Pretoria 0002, South Africa. It suggests that ubuntu itself is homeless and displaced as a way of being human together. Instead of the mediation of dignity and justice through an ubuntu-solidarity, street homeless people and others living vulnerably and in precarious circumstances are violated and excluded through a displacement of ubuntu-values. It suggests a growing disconnect between the philosophy of ubuntu and its actual embodiment in the local urban political economy, local faith communities and local universities. I argue for the recovery of an ubuntu, precisely in the face of and in solidarity with homeless communities, and, in a different sense, in acknowledgement of our universal longing to be ‘at home’
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