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作者

来源

URBAN STUDIES,Vol.55,Issue9,P.2057-2072

语言

英文

关键字

film; film reception; inequality; Johannesburg; stereotype; urban knowledge; SPACE; CITY

作者单位

[Parker, Alexandra] Univ Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa. Parker, A (reprint author), Univ Witwatersrand, SARChi Spatial Anal & City Planning, 1 Jan Smuts Ave, ZA-2050 Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa. E-Mail: alexandra.parker@wits.ac.za

摘要

Stereotypes are people or things categorised by general characteristics of the group based on a truth that is widely recognised and function to reduce ideas to a simpler form (Dyer, 1993). Not all stereotypes are pejorative but can be a form of othering of people (Bhabha, 1996) and come about through a friction with difference (Jameson, 1995). In Johannesburg, South Africa, there is a conflation of people and space that results in a form of spatial categorisation or stereotyping. Under the apartheid government the city's spaces were divided by race and ethnicity and are currently shifting towards divisions of class and inequality deepening the fragmented post-apartheid conditions in the city. These spatial categories have been represented in films of Johannesburg and contribute to the construction of the city's image but also construct images for particular neighbourhoods. In this paper I examine the use of space in film as a narrative device and explore the reception and understanding of Johannesburg's spaces by its residents to illustrate the construction and reception of spatial stereotypes. The paper discusses three dominant spatial stereotypes of Johannesburg through key films and the reception of these films through quantitative and qualitative interviews conducted with residents in four locations (Chiawelo; CBD; Fordsburg and Melville) in Johannesburg. Stereotypes have negative consequences and these spatial stereotypes reflect the 'city of extremes' (Murray, 2011) but their use indicates a process of navigation and negotiation across differences in space and identity in the fragmented city of Johannesburg.