{"product_id":"buy-the-blinded-city-ten-years-in-inner-city-johannesburg-matthew-wilhelm-solomon-conf20250701002","title":"The Blinded City: Ten Years In Inner-City Johannesburg (Matthew Wilhelm-Solomon)","description":"\u003ch1\u003e The Blinded City: Ten Years In Inner-City Johannesburg \u003c\/h1\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Author: Matthew Wilhelm-Solomon \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch2\u003e About Book \u003c\/h2\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Publisher: Picador Africa \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Published date: 2020-01-14 \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Pages: 285 \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e isbn: 9781770107946.0 \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e GoodReads Rating: 4.3 \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003e Condition \u0026amp; Size \u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Size: Format C (Large Format) \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e Book Type: Paperback \u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e \u003cstrong\u003e Condition: Very Good \u003c\/strong\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch4\u003e Summary\u003c\/h4\u003e\u003cp\u003e\nAmid evictions, raids, killings, the drug trade, and fire, inner-city Johannesburg residents seek safety and a home. A grandmother struggles to keep her granddaughter as she is torn away from her. A mother seeks healing in the wake of her son’s murder. And displaced by a city’s drive for urban regeneration, a group of blind migrants try to carve out an existence.\n\nThe Blinded City recounts the history of inner-city Johannesburg from 2010 to 2019, primarily from the perspectives of the unlawful occupiers of spaces knas hijacked buildings, bad buildings or dark buildings. Tens of thousands of residents, both South African and foreign national, live in these buildings in dire conditions. This book tells the story of these sites, and the court cases around them, ones that strike at the centre of who has the right to occupy the city.\n\n\nIn February 2010, while Johannesburg prepared for the FIFA World Cup, the South Gauteng High Court ordered the eviction of the unlawful occupiers of an abandoned carpet factory on Saratoga Avenue and that the city’s Metropolitan Municipality provide temporary emergency accommodation for the evicted. The case, which became known as Blue Moonlight and went to the Constitutional Court, catalysed a decade of struggles over housing and eviction in Johannesburg.\n\n\nThe Blinded City chronicles this case, among others, and the aftermath – a tumultuous period in the city characterised by recurrent dispossessions, police and immigration operations, outbursts of xenophobic violence, and political and l change. All through the decade, there is the backdrop of successive mayors and their attempts to ‘clean up’ the city, and the struggles of residents and urban housing activists for homes and a better life.\n\n\nThe interwoven narratives present a compelling mosaic of life in post-apartheid Johannesburg, one of the globe’s most infamous and vital cities\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Wilhelm-Solomon, Matthew","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":41899163877453,"sku":"CONF20250701002","price":135.0,"currency_code":"ZAR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0557\/3856\/4685\/files\/9781770107946_20250616_110350.jpg?v=1751380452","url":"https:\/\/readmatter.co.za\/products\/buy-the-blinded-city-ten-years-in-inner-city-johannesburg-matthew-wilhelm-solomon-conf20250701002","provider":"Readmatter","version":"1.0","type":"link"}