Jak przeżyć w afrykańskim mieście? Człowiek wobec pograniczności oraz procesów urbanizacyjnych w południowosudańskiej Dżubie
How to survive in an African city? A human in the face of borderlineness and urbanisation in Juba, South Sudan

Author(s): Maciej Kurcz
Subject(s): Cultural Anthropology / Ethnology
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego
Keywords: African city; urbanisation in Juba, South Sudan
Summary/Abstract: The subject of the study entitled How to survive in an African city? A human inthe face of borderlineness and urbanisation in Juba, South Sudan is the spontaneouscity spreading process of Juba, the capital of South Sudan. But, the viewpointtaken while describing the phenomenon in question is the one of daily activitiesof an average human being, who in this particular case is a recent urban migrant.All the factographic data come from the series of ethnographic research conductedin Juba, South Sudan in the years 2007—2008.Adapting to the new environment is a fundamental matter for every migrant.It is not an easy task. For this very city is characterized by extremely harsh livingconditions. There is not enough water supply and no sewage system, not mentioningthe electricity. The drastic price increase results from the underdeveloped publictransport infrastructure and, what is more, the migrants of various ethnic andcultural origins, usually intertwined with traditionalism and conservatism, add tothe picture. This kind of melting pot makes the majority of city-dwellers feel alienated.What is even worse, the already tensed atmosphere is overlapped by manifoldtraumatic war experiences. From our perspective, Juba is a dysfunctional city.Colloquially, it could be called a safe haven or even a strongbox, that is the placewhere for now one has the greatest chance to survive in the post-war South Sudan.Therefore, it reminds more of a refugee camp than a city. In spite of difficultiespiling up in front of them, newcomers try to familiarize the hostile surroundingsby finding a job and, as far as possible, turning their flats into places tolive, conceptualizing the landscape, organizing their time, facing the lonelinessand alienation, to blend into surroundings. In short, they struggle to survive, andconcurrently, try to definitively cut away the past of the urban migrant or repatriatedrefugee. For the inhabitants, family is the value of utmost importance in copingwith everyday problems. It is one of family’s basic tasks. For that reason it isstructured in a particular way, mostly as a nuclear family, but frequently also temporarilyextended to the closest relatives. The structure of family is formed toa high degree by manufacturing capacities of its members, hence in the city’s realityone cannot forget to generate income. It is in family where genetically differentcultural traditions (African, Islamic and Christian) blend and unite into one,which makes them indistinguishable from one another. One of the institutionsthat clearly illustrate this situation is marriage, where the dialogue between varioustraditions, between the “old” and the “new” reality, is perfectly visible. Theinflux of alien elements is not in a least seen as hostile. Quite the contrary, wecan observe the tendency to express cosmopolitism through that which is local.The social hierarchy in the city is characterized by mutual dependence ofdiverse social groups. Never before has the life in the city depended so much ona cooperation and the engagement in generating income of each member of a family.The phenomenon manifests itself on every level of social identification. Inthe entire Africa, the voluntary association of a different kind have become ananswer to the structural crisis. On the continent, social groups such as womenand children acquire the significance. Their role increase in importance, especiallyeconomically. Concurrently, this growing importance is not followed by the improvementin the poor social status of those groups, since there are still excludedand discriminated against. Generally, the citizen of Juba copes with her/his financialproblems similarly to inhabitants of other African cities. Apart from havinga full-time job to earn indispensable money, in order to balance the family budget,she/he has to also be engaged — more often than not, in the same time — in manyinformal extra jobs (small businesses, producing and selling food, trans-bordertrade). Frequently, all members of a family participate in such a activities. Thus,diversification of the income sources is a universal strategy. Every member of a city-living family (male or female, including the youngest) is engaged in both formaland informal ways of earning money. No one is economically useless.Citizens of Juba help themselves by seeking economic connections with neighboringAfrican cities. Those appear to be especially financially gratifying. An inhabitantof African city to thrive has to be extremely active spatially — and be notonly to cross the border of her/his own neighborhood but also to leave her/his hometown.Obviously, huge significance of the practice of that kind stems from thecloseness of the country border. Ex-refugees are the leaders of trans-border contacts.Those people are actual intermediaries between Sudan and neighbor countries.By their mobility their transmit the new cultures, elements of democracyand free-market economy. It is a very useful knowledge in terms of nowadaysJuba reality.The ethnicity of Juba is naturally pertained to certain dimensions of reality(e.g. politics, culture), for which it seems important and overemphasized. In otherdimensions it seems marginalized or even hidden. The city creates new identifications,but also sustains, reproduces and strengthens the old ones. Ethnicity is dynamicand appears more and more relative — it is based on the situation of an individual,her/his needs in the urban environment. But essentially, the city isa place with no ethnicity at all, it peculiarity stems form this fact.What is formed in the city are the new, broader identifications. Firstly, theirbond is the war-time wandering. Fundamental cultural transformations are triggeredby the emigration. Those changes are visible regardless of the social origin ofan observer. The Sudan conflict had the features of a religious war. Among others,it has lead to kidnapping religion by politics, and exercising the “friend — foe” categories.The results of this are palpable in the post-war Juba — the city of culturesand conflicts. Religion seems there a pivot of national identity, which is dra-matically visible in the city’s Muslin community. Creed is used by both Christiansand Muslims to erase the ethnicity. It rests as a kind of umbrella opened over theheads of people representing different ethnicities, giving a chance to adjust easilyto the city’s community. The religion of the greatest importance is Christianity. Ittreated as a natural source of the city culture, its plays as well as secular rituals.One cannot also forget about the significance of various Christian churches forcommon man facing everyday difficulties. Facilitating the initial stage of her/hiscity life, when the individual is in the most urgent need of help. In this sense, theChristian churches of Juba are a kind of bridge between the village and the city.Thus, despite the difficulties, the city’s development is visible, which stemsmore from the bottom-up initiative of the common individuals than this of the localauthorities. Juba is a world tediously built by the hands of its inhabitants. Itsshape and size reflect their ambitions and abilities. The phenomenon of borderlineness— the closeness of the country’s border — appears to be helpful in this process.It influences the effectiveness of the citizens’ activities, it is an answer to thespontaneous city spreading processes — it brings danger, but most of all, infinitepossibilities.

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