It has been just over a year since the few weeks of seeming madness in May 2008, when xenophobic violence broke out across South Africa, shocking the nation and attracting international condemnation. However, migrant women in South Africa consider that period as an example, albeit extreme, of what they experience in their daily lives as foreigners in South Africa.

Research recently conducted by the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) on migrant women in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban – before, during and after the xenophobic attacks in May 2008 – found migrant women’s daily experiences of xenophobia far-reaching. While both men and women experience some forms of xenophobia - such as lack of housing, healthcare and unemployment, as well as discrimination at the hands of the police and the Department of Home Affairs – some manifestations of xenophobia are particularly gendered.

Foreign migrant women are often more visible, and therefore more vulnerable to exploitation and xenophobia, through various “markers of difference” that set them apart from South Africans, including language, accents, traditional clothing, and cultural practices.

Perhaps most disturbing was the reaction of nurses in a local hospital to a migrant woman giving birth and on whom female circumcision had been performed. The nurses called their colleagues to come over and look at the woman’s genitalia, all the while asking, while the woman was in labour, “What is wrong with this lady? What happened to her?” The migrant woman became a spectacle; her anatomical differences, rather than her welfare, had the attention of the nurses, exacerbating the woman’s discomfort and humiliating her in the process.

The CSVR study found that many foreign women become silent as a measure of safety, choosing not to speak in public for fear of identification as foreign. Migrant women also often have a particular style of dressing that is culturally important to them, which they change as a survival strategy. As one woman explained, “We change our behaviour just to be like the people we live together with here. Because we thought if we continue to dress the same way we did in our country, the people will segregate us.”

As society generally considers women traditional bearers of culture, identity and belonging becomes a distinctly gendered problem for women migrants. Migrant women express a great need to preserve their identity after losing so much through their displacement. However, holding onto their “distinguishing” identity impedes their integration into their new communities.

In many cases, the inability to return home (because of ongoing conflict, violence or political oppression) coupled with the inability to fully and successfully integrate locally means that migrant women feel caught between two systems, unable to fully belong to or identify with either of them.

A sense of safety or insecurity often follows one’s sense of identity and belonging; migrant women in this study spoke of their continual fear, and consequent loss of freedom, in South Africa. Some felt that the only way for them to keep safe was to stay at home, thereby avoiding any interaction with South Africans.

A woman migrant’s relationship with her family also renders her experience of displacement very different to a man’s. Women migrants often face long periods of separation from loved ones, for reasons of family support, security, practicality and even education, resulting in an intense sense of loss.

The impact of xenophobia on children is a primary concern for mothers. Many women cite examples of xenophobic threats or attacks on their children. Mothers felt unable to protect their children from the fear and trauma of these attacks, making them feel derelict in their duties as mothers and powerless to save their children from harm.

Moreover, children noticed the attitudes and attacks directed at their parents and families, and felt the weight and threat of this discrimination. One respondent told CSVR of coming home during the xenophobic attacks in May, greeted by her son with the words, “Mummy you are not dead.”

Women migrants also tend to carry the burden of caring for their families, which, as illustrated above, entails not only economic support, but also psychological and emotional support. The weight of economic responsibility is immense, especially in a context where migrant women struggle to find work amidst widespread discriminatory attitudes and practices.

The power imbalances inherent in any male-female relationship are worse in situations where women are more vulnerable; in this case, migrant women are particularly vulnerable to abuse, not only from South African men, but also from their own husbands. The migrant women in this study explained that in their home countries, cultural laws, families and the community can protect women.

Migrant women often start working and have their own money for the first time. Their husbands can find this situation unfamiliar and threatening, which can result in domestic violence and/or separation. There is little community or family protection for migrant women in South Africa and, because of the inaccessibility of the police, there is no system to report violence against them, making them vulnerable to ongoing intimate partner violence.

As well, many migrant women felt sexually preyed upon by South African men, who exploited their vulnerability as foreign women in an unfamiliar context, often in risky employment, without recourse to the law, and without community support and protection.

Migrant women are, however, surprisingly resilient, clearly evident in their efforts to earn an honest living, educate their children, and provide for their families. Many relatively well-educated migrant women had worked as car-guards in order to make ends meet; some using these earning for further education or to start their own business.

In addition, migrant women employ a variety of coping mechanisms to make life bearable in South Africa. These included belonging to religious groups, as well as family and friends, and support groups accessed through migrant organisations.

Their resilience in the face of such hardship and within such an unforgiving context pays tribute to the strength and perseverance of migrant women in South Africa, despite all the odds.

* Romi Sigsworth is a Senior Researcher with the Gender-Based Violence Programme of the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation.

*The full research report is available from http://www.csvr.org.za or Sufiya Bray [email][email protected] This article is part of the Gender Links Opinion and Commentary Service.