Africana Periodical Literature 
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| Title: | Town women and country wives: migrant labour, family politics and housing preferences at Vaal Reefs mine |
| Authors: | Moodie, T. Dunbar Ndatshe, Vivienne |
| Year: | 1992 |
| Periodical: | Labour, Capital and Society |
| Volume: | 25 |
| Issue: | 1 |
| Pages: | 116-132 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | South Africa |
| Subjects: | labour migration workers' housing women mining |
| Abstract: | This study examines the complex migration and urbanization patterns in the Far West Rand mining area of South Africa. It focuses on the attitudes of women and their partners to the various housing options currently available at Vaal Reefs mine. Interviews were conducted by Vivienne Ndatshe with Xhosa-speaking women over a six-month period (June-December 1990). She conducted interviews with 77 women who had relationships with black miners and observed conditions at the black township of Kanana, at the Vaal Reefs black married quarters, at Mandela Park (the site-and-service area at Kanana which was recently opened up) and at black townships near Klerksdorp, Stilfontein and Carletonville. Differences in women's life choices and in their preferences for permanent urban settlement seem to depend in part on their age but largely on whether they have access to workable rural land. The majority of persons who moved onto State-sponsored site-and-service schemes or to squatter settlements on the periphery of townships are either those crowded out of the townships themselves or people moved off surrounding farms. The conclusion is that flexible housing options are needed on and around the mines. Notes, ref., sum. in French. |