Homelessness in Berea Park, Hillbrow

Abstract

Moving through Hillbrow one observes groups and individuals who are homeless. They are clad in grimy grey tatters and are slovenly in appearance; they have dry, dishevelled and unkempt hair along with soot shades of skin, dazed and avoiding eyes, dry lips, cracked fingertips and fingernails encrusted with crud. Some of them are barefooted. Such individuals are visible in different parts of Hillbrow such as Pretoria Street, Jaegar Park, Kotze Street (near Highpoint Shopping Centre) and Berea Park, which borders on Hillbrow and Berea. They are also a feature of other South African cities like Durban and Cape Town. They are people who have no residential dwelling, survive on the streets and sleep in derelict buildings, under freeway decks, on city sidewalks and in public parks. It is Berea Park on which this chapter focuses by describing and understanding homelessness in the context of migration, diversity and state indifference. Nationality, language, age and gender are shown to be key intersectional categories of difference among the homeless. In order to provide contextual information, I begin by describing some demographic impressions of the homeless people in Hillbrow.