Professional Affiliation

Professor of Anthropology, Emory University

Wilson Center Project

"Ethnic Conflict in the 1990s: The Case of South Africa"

Project Summary

One of the most troubling aspects of our post-Cold War world is an increase in ethnic violence in a number of parts of the globe. The proposed project involves the writing up of field materials collected in a particular ethnic conflict that occurred on a gold mine in South Africa during its historic elections in 1994. Zulus were attacked and expelled from the mine compound, and eventually three men lost their lives. The proposed analysis intends to highlight how individual actors' narratives of local history instilled a "fear of the future, lived through the past" in a context dominated by modern media such as television.