Article By: Sfiso Benard Nxumalo
Oppression, when written about, is often reduced to one layer of suffering. Yet when one unpacks the lives and narratives of the poor it becomes clear that their struggle to survive takes place under many layers of oppression.
By Frank Meintjies
Where is poverty located? What are its shapes and forms? What strategies do households use to cope?
As academics, journalists, social commentators and activists we have a sense that we know the poor. We are outraged by poverty and inequality and advocate for equity and a life of dignity for all. We look for ways to bring the voices of the poor into the public debate and ask questions around how we can get democracy to work for the poor. But few of us have even an inkling of the full spectrum of what it means to be poor.
Poststructuralist psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, has argued that humans distinguish themselves from animals in the instant during which shit becomes something shameful.