Intergroup contact and desegregation in the new South Africa

Abstract

This paper highlights some limitations of research on the contact hypothesis. In the first section, we criticize the practice of describing social intercourse between groups in terms of predefined categories, which tend to void the process of its situated meanings, often reducing it to a quantitative index. Intergroup contact, we argue, acquires meaning within everyday practice and argumentation as individuals try to make sense of others' co‐presence. By disregarding this, researchers have overlooked how lay accounts of contact, and of the nature of the social groups in contact, may accomplish racism. In the second section, illustrating this argument, we examine a recent case of desegregation in South Africa. This concerns the relocation of a ‘black’ squatter community into an area that was designated ‘white’ during the apartheid era. Through discourse analysis of interview data, we identify several constructions of interaction between ‘squatters’ and ‘property owners’. We focus on a set of accounts in which contact was portrayed as a form of territorial invasion, exploring their local rhetorical and broader ideological functions.

‘Our way of life is worth defending’: testing a model of attitudes towards superordinate group membership through a study of Scots' attitudes towards Britain

“…Instead, one must look at the situated social meanings that are attached to the relevant social identities. That is, just as it has been argued that attitudes to outgroup members in situations of intergroup contact depend upon the meaning that members ascribe to the presence of the other (Dixon, Durrheim, & Tredoux, 2005;Dixon & Reicher, 1997), so attitudes toward integration with other groups depend upon the significance that members ascribe to union with the other and its consequence for ingroup identity. Do 'we' risk being subordinated by others within the larger body, or will we maintain or even enhance our identity as a group and our ability to realise this identity?…”

Preserving Spatial and Temporal Dimensions in Observational Data of Segregation

“…It is not our concern here to provide a detailed discussion of, and justifi cation for, this claim, as several authors have already done this (cf. Dixon and Reicher, 1997). We do wish to point out that intergroup contact has been conceptualised in a decontextualised manner in social psychology, and this has had several consequences.…”

The Spaces between Us: A Spatial Analysis of Informal Segregation at a South African University

“…Dixon and Reicher (1997) emphasized the importance of assessing lay theories and interpretations of contact through the day‐to‐day talk of those who come into contact. Intergroup contact, they argue, “acquires meaning within everyday practice and argumentation as individuals try to make sense of others’ copresence” (p. 361).…”