“Whole masses of uncharted territory”: Metaphors, Internal Spatiality, and Racialized Relationships in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Abstract

Abstract Less than thirty years ago, South Africa still had laws strictly prohibiting “interracial” intimacy. In this study, participants shared stories of living in Cape Town with a partner of a different “race” and invoked spatial metaphors, of boundaries and border crossing, describing their experiences in cartographical, “landscaped” language. This article reflects on how these metaphors relate to deeper social dynamics that shape the lives of those in “race”—trangressing relationships, and their own sense of agency in managing the correlative inner landscape. We suggest that these relationships are symbolic sites where society performs processes of ongoing racialization.