Two St.Gallen Collegium fellows, Dr. Robby Kapesa and Dr. Khanyile Mlotshwa, will reflect on ethnography as a discursive space that makes knowledge about the Southern African region possible.
The two fellows will present on two challenges to creating knowledge. While for Dr. Kapesa, ethnographic work can be liberating as it affords him the chance to centre the voices of the subalternised peasants in global scholarship, for Dr. Mlotshwa, doing ethnography at ‘home’ comes with the challenge of familiarity. Dr. Kapesa will speak to the topic, Extractivism and Local Livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa: Experiences from Zambia’s Copper Mining Communities and Dr. Mlotshwa will speak to the topic, ‘Gone native or always already native’: Challenges encountered by a migrant scholar in conducting ethnographic research in Johannesburg, South Africa.
