Mothers on the move: manyanos and the social history of transportation in a South African homeland township, 1963–1990

Abstract

ABSTRACT Histories of bus boycotts and of the taxi business in apartheid South Africa have been told with male activists and taxi entrepreneurs as the protagonists. Women’s oral histories reframe transportation history to include the experiences of commuters. This article is a history of travel by African Christian women’s organizations (manyanos) in the township of Mdantsane. Township infrastructure presented barriers to these social organizations, but in the 1960s and 1970s manyanos adapted their mobility practices to attract members. The bus boycotts of the 1980s and the growth of the taxi industry were connected to protest against the apartheid order. However, this revolution in transportation had ambiguous consequences for commuters. As dissatisfied commuters in the late-apartheid urban landscape, manyano women continued to innovate travelling strategies to maintain local and long-distance connections. Their experiences show that commuters, as well as governments and transport-owners, shape the possibilities of urban travel in twentieth-century Africa.