Who Will be the Shade of Our Tree When You Leave? Collaborating as Women to Advance Community Emancipation

Abstract

In 1994, out of a population of 45 million people an estimated 7.7 million people lived in informal settlements in South Africa (South African Institute of Race Relations, 1994). This article focuses on one community whose residents' desperation to own housing contributed to community disintegration, typified by infighting among women, and threats to human life. Issues of diversity became more prominent and destabilized community-building efforts. One effort to collaboratively break down barriers that deterred women from working together is presented to illustrate how these women created bonds based on "discovered similarities." The participatory and personal-experience approach described here contributed to their becoming active protagonists of their learning and encouraged tolerance and understanding among community women from differing ethnic, linguistic, and political backgrounds. The article concludes with a discussion of the critical importance of recognizing and working with and through differences within the current South African reality.