Maputo: Ethnography of a Divided City

Abstract

Rapid urbanisation is one of the most dramatic developments on the African continent, often yielding contrasting and shocking images of affluent businesses and residential districts alongside sprawling shantytowns or slums. Urban areas account for an increasing part of the continent’s positive macro-economic development and represent opportunities for employment, education, health, leisure and well-being. However, urban growth is also manifested in emerging conditions of inequality and poverty, rising environmental problems, situations of political instability and riots, as well as persistent high levels of urban crime and violence. This film project seeks to visualise Maputo: one of Africa’s divided cities. It is part of the research project “The Ethnography of a Divided City. Socio-Politics, Poverty and Gender in Maputo, Mozambique” headed by the Chr. Michelsen Institute and funded by the Norwegian Research Council. While the film relates actively to the research project, it approaches the project’s themes from new and original angles and ANIMA has had full artistic freedom in its filmic approach. A focus on the people inhabiting the city’s so-called bairros (districts/areas) provides a privileged view of the way in which symbolic and material boundaries of various urban spaces are contested, negotiated and, ultimately, inscribed onto mental maps of the city. Contributors: Inge Tvedten, Chr. Michelsen Institute, Head of project Fábio Ribeiro, ANIMA - Estúdio Criativo, Production and photo João Graça, ANIMA - Estúdio Criativo, Production and photo Bjørn Enge Bertelsen, Department of Social Anthropology, University of Bergen, Research advisor