{"id":6127,"date":"2025-08-08T13:10:29","date_gmt":"2025-08-08T11:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/?page_id=6127"},"modified":"2026-10-30T16:44:29","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T15:44:29","slug":"malawi-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/?page_id=6127","title":{"rendered":"South Africa and Malawi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">South Africa and Malawi: Translocal confinement<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left has-medium-font-size\">Who leaves Malawi? How do they survive South Africa? and how are they experiencing translocal confinement across Lilongwe and Cape Town?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-ba77ba23-6125-46a4-aaa2-309fb60b1ac6\">These are questions the ZA-MAL team will explore. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-53f6737f-5d58-4ec8-abb4-f9af6d044be7\">For more than a century, Malawians have migrated in their thousands to South Africa. Translocal bonds have been created, disrupted, and reconfigured in relation to social transformations. Translocal links have diversified over time from originally centering around the industrial heartland of metropolitan Johannesburg, to now also including Cape Town\u2019s squatter camps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-9b40d3d7-9a37-440f-ad8a-f702f78c1bd8\">Here, Malawian migrants find themselves in extortionate relations with gangs and residents, confined to cramped living spaces and precarious parts of the labour market. They are faced with oppressive policing relations under threat of detention and deportation. At the same time, many Malawians manage to establish a life and future for their children in Cape Town. It is these simultaneous and contradictory stories of confinement and hope that we will unearth by exploring translocal kin and family relations across Cape Town, South Africa and Lilongwe, Malawi. We seek answer to the following questions:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul id=\"block-673e8637-2413-46fa-8f4d-b125cc9e81ed\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>What are the memories and experiences of confinement \u2013 due to economic marginalisation, stuckness, incarceration, and forced displacement \u2013 across Lilongwe and Cape Town?&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>How is confinement experienced and perceived across lines of gender and generation?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Which infrastructures of migration exist to enable or prevent movement &#8211; as migration routes have become increasingly arduous, dangerous, and expensive for migrants to South Africa?&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-5724e45f-5075-4e98-8f9b-e9ac497a0fcf\">The ZA-MAL team comprises three researchers: Daphne Langwe, Shannon Morreira, Steffen Jensen, Austin Ndala, and Tamuka Chekero.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:2px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide is-content-justification-space-between is-nowrap is-layout-flex wp-container-core-group-is-layout-cb46ffcb wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-rounded\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"818\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201-818x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6451\" style=\"aspect-ratio:3\/4;object-fit:cover;width:auto;height:230px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201-818x1024.jpg 818w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201-240x300.jpg 240w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201-768x961.jpg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201-1227x1536.jpg 1227w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Daphne-photo-e1749547113201.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 818px) 100vw, 818px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-rounded\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"819\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shannon-photo-e1749546951319-819x1024.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6452\" style=\"aspect-ratio:3\/4;object-fit:cover;width:auto;height:230px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shannon-photo-e1749546951319-819x1024.jpeg 819w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shannon-photo-e1749546951319-240x300.jpeg 240w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shannon-photo-e1749546951319-768x960.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Shannon-photo-e1749546951319.jpeg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large is-resized is-style-rounded\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"819\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-819x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5875\" style=\"aspect-ratio:3\/4;object-fit:cover;width:auto;height:230px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-819x1024.jpg 819w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-240x300.jpg 240w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-768x961.jpg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-1228x1536.jpg 1228w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924-1637x2048.jpg 1637w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/Steffen_photo_2-e1749546748924.jpg 1765w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized is-style-rounded\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"530\" height=\"663\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-27-kl.-16.33.40.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6798\" style=\"aspect-ratio:3\/4;object-fit:cover;width:auto;height:230px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-27-kl.-16.33.40.png 530w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-27-kl.-16.33.40-240x300.png 240w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 530px) 100vw, 530px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full is-resized is-style-rounded\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"470\" height=\"628\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-30-kl.-15.49.20-2.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6823\" style=\"aspect-ratio:3\/4;object-fit:cover;width:auto;height:230px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-30-kl.-15.49.20-2.png 470w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Skaermbillede-2026-10-30-kl.-15.49.20-2-225x300.png 225w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 470px) 100vw, 470px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"block-fa214d82-7a12-4a75-bb9e-08dd094b49d8\">Migrant experiences in townships <em>by Steffen Jensen<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-5866a851-0c78-4239-81e4-d81130444319\">I have worked in a Cape Town squatter camp for years and have wondered about the increasing number of Malawians. They live in and alongside the multiple crises that beset Cape Town townships \u2013 gang wars, political protests, land invasions, crumbling infrastructure \u2013 as well as their precarious relations to neighbors and landlords, gang structures of governance, policing and employers. &nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-gallery has-nested-images columns-4 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-1 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"844\" height=\"744\" data-id=\"6214\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0004.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6214\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0004.jpg 844w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0004-300x264.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0004-768x677.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 844px) 100vw, 844px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"840\" height=\"745\" data-id=\"6216\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0005.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6216\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0005.jpg 840w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0005-300x266.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0005-768x681.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 840px) 100vw, 840px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"813\" height=\"762\" data-id=\"6215\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0006.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6215\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0006.jpg 813w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0006-300x281.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0006-768x720.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 813px) 100vw, 813px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"814\" height=\"796\" data-id=\"6217\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0007.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6217\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0007.jpg 814w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0007-300x293.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/IMG-20250820-WA0007-768x751.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 814px) 100vw, 814px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text has-media-on-the-right is-stacked-on-mobile is-vertically-aligned-center\" style=\"grid-template-columns:auto 38%\"><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I first became aware of the importance of confinement when my friend Mitch told me the following in 2018: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><em>\u201cThere is no right for us here [in Cape Town]. You feel like you are in prison. See this phone. It is mine. I bought it. But I cannot use it openly. Someone will come and take it away. If I refuse, they can take my life. I got money but I cannot count it. I have to be in private to count it. I cannot work at night. By 6 o\u2019clock I have to be in my house. Like a chicken, like a cow. Maybe it is worse than prison because a prisoner at least knows what will happen.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"726\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro-1024x726.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6140 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro-1024x726.png 1024w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro-300x213.png 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro-768x545.png 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro-1536x1090.png 1536w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/ZA-steffens-project-intro.png 1586w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"block-a6353e0a-f431-49a0-b9a0-f007aeb15822\">I want to find out how my interlocutors survive and prosper, and which part their family and kinship relations play. This will help us understand&nbsp;issues around confinement on a conceptual level. I will reconnect with friends and acquaintances while paying added attention to their networks back home, and I <strong><em>really <\/em><\/strong>want to go with them and spend time in Malawi.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Malawian children and childhoods in Cape Town <em>by Shannon Morreira<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text is-stacked-on-mobile is-vertically-aligned-center\" style=\"grid-template-columns:38% auto\"><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited-1024x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6206 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited-768x769.jpg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-1-edited.jpg 1318w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p>In the past, migration between Malawi and South Africa mostly involved men. Men would travel to South Africa for work, while grandmothers, mothers and children usually stayed behind in Malawi. Families were therefore split across countries, and money was sent home to support those left behind. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today, that pattern is beginning to shift. More families are moving together, with men, women, and children from Malawi now living together in Cape Town. Many of these families face extremely difficult living conditions, with limited opportunities and little ability to move beyond the neighborhoods where they settle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns are-vertically-aligned-bottom is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-28f84493 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:70%\">\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\">In this part of the wider ZA-MAL project, I focus on these children\u2019s experiences. I will talk, draw and play with children in schools in Cape Town, using participatory art and storytelling methods to explore their understandings of our shared world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\">This way we can explore children\u2019s views, as we work together to theorise confinement within the context of mobility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:30%\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignfull\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"768\" height=\"1024\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-2-768x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6201\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-2-768x1024.jpg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-2-225x300.jpg 225w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-2-1152x1536.jpg 1152w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Shannon-pic-2-rotated.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Confined Beyond Returning Home? <em>By<\/em> <em>Austin Ndala<\/em> <\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>I am a lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Population Studies at the University of Malawi, where I also serve as Programme Coordinator for Social Work and Research Coordinator. My academic background is in Sociology and Social Work. My previous work has revolved around social work education and practice, social policy, indigenous knowledge systems, asylum seeking children and young people. Across these fields I keep asking how local ways of knowing and organising hold up against frameworks imported from elsewhere. That question draws me to people whom borders, violence and forced movement push away from the places they call home. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My proposed study in the project is: <em>Confined Beyond <\/em><em>Returning Home?<\/em><em> <\/em><em>Relocation, Confinement and the Reconfiguration of Family Life among Malawians Returning from South Africa<\/em><em>. <\/em>The study follows Malawian migrants forced to return amid the 2026 anti-immigrant crackdown and violence in South Africa. It does not assume that return ends displacement. Instead it treats home as a place, a relationship and an experience that has to be remade. It views return home as a process within families rather than a single isolated event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Within CONFINED, I will be working in WP1 on the South Africa-Malawi (ZA-MAL) case as the Malawi-based researcher on relocation and return, working among family networks alongside a Cape Town-based colleague who focuses. My project adds the Malawian side of translocal confinement between Malawi and South Africa and brings \u2018home\u2019 in as a third concept beside confinement and return. In turn, the CONFINED offers a comparative frame, an established ZA-MAL team and a wider agenda on urban marginality, displacement and incarceration. These will sharpen my analysis and place Malawian experiences of return in a global conversation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><em>financial confinement<\/em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>financial mobility<\/em> for migrants across southern africa <em>By Tamuka Chekero<\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n<p>I am an anthropologist whose research examines migration, urban life, infrastructure, and the everyday practices through which people negotiate institutional constraints and sustain their livelihoods across Southern Africa. Drawing on ethnographic approaches and Southern African epistemologies, my work explores how social relationships, material infrastructures, and bureaucratic systems shape migrants\u2019 experiences of mobility, belonging, and economic participation. I engage in concepts such as&nbsp;<em>hushamwari<\/em>&nbsp;(relational friendship and mutual recognition) and&nbsp;<em>kuhanyisana<\/em>&nbsp;(mutual care and the practices of living together) to understand how people cultivate social networks and negotiate the uncertainties of everyday life. I hold a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Cape Town (2023) and is currently a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship, University of Pretoria. My previous research have examined urban space, health governance, water insecurity, and the bureaucratic production of legality and exclusion among migrant communities in Cape Town and Gauteng.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>My research project investigates the intersections of financial infrastructures, migrant livelihoods, and transnational social relations among Malawian migrants in Johannesburg and Pretoria. It approaches financial life as more than the movement of money, examining how everyday economic practices are embedded in social relationships, informal trade, family and household responsibilities, and cross-border obligations. The project considers activities such as the circulation and sale of regional goods, spaza-shop trading in informal settlements and the use of financial services to support livelihoods and maintain relationships across national borders. Through multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork, semi-structured interviews, and practice-based mapping, the research traces how migrants navigate formal banking institutions, remittance platforms such as Mukuru and Mama Money, mobile money services, and informal financial networks. It pays particular attention to how migrants experience, negotiate, and incorporate these financial arrangements into everyday livelihood strategies, including how they draw on social networks to overcome institutional barriers and sustain transnational connections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The project contributes directly to&nbsp;<strong>CONFINED<\/strong> by examining how financial infrastructures and regulatory arrangements shape migrants\u2019 economic mobility and capacity to participate in transnational economic life. Documentation requirements, Know Your Customer (KYC) procedures, transaction limits, and institutional assessments of identity can serve as mechanisms that differentiate, restrict, and regulate access to financial services. From an anthropological perspective, the project examines not only these formal constraints but also how they are encountered, navigated and negotiated in everyday practice. It uses the concepts of&nbsp;<em>financial confinement<\/em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>financial mobility<\/em>&nbsp;to explore the tensions between institutional regulation and migrants\u2019 efforts to maintain economic autonomy, support households, and fulfil obligations across borders. Rather than treating migrants solely as subjects of exclusion, the research foregrounds their agency, social relationships, and practical knowledge, showing how they mobilise informal networks and alternative financial arrangements to navigate restrictive systems. By grounding these questions in the lived experiences of Malawian migrants in Johannesburg and Pretoria, the project extends CONFINED\u2019s broader inquiry into the relationships between infrastructure, governance, mobility, and exclusion. It also highlights how financial systems are not merely technical mechanisms for transferring money but social and institutional arrangements that shape who can participate in economic life, on what terms, and with what consequences for everyday belonging and transnational connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-left\">PhD Project <em>By Daphne Langwe<\/em> :<\/h5>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-left\">Ndende Yosaoneka: The Paradox of Economic Opportunity and Confinement Among Malawian Labor Migrant Families in Cape Town<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-media-text has-media-on-the-right is-stacked-on-mobile\"><div class=\"wp-block-media-text__content\">\n<p>I  grew up alongside and surrounded by Malawi-South Africa migration experiences. The awareness and perspectives of Malawi-South Africa labor migration is one that changes with age and time. It is one that wraps up economic opportunity, mobility, and situations of confinement that come along with it although the latter is less spoken about and to some extent lacks the vocabulary to describe and explain it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For many Malawian families, migration has meant not only the opening of borders and possibilities, but also the closing down of freedoms in everyday life. This migration creates and affirms different forms of confinement among family members including economic and digital confinement, but also confinement of dreams and aspirations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For some families, these cycles of confinement affect several generations in a family as children, relatives, and grandparents are pulled in to \u2018help\u2019 and support.<\/p>\n<\/div><figure class=\"wp-block-media-text__media\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL-1024x576.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-6510 size-full\" srcset=\"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/NY-ZA-MAL.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>So, although the Malawi-South Africa labor migration has historically been predominantly undertaken by men &#8211; women and entire families now also undertake the journey. Studying Malawian labor migrants in South Africa therefore necessitates studying the whole family. Not only to examine migration as mobility, but also to confront the ways in which movement produces immobility. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Confinement here is not a single condition but a constellation of overlapping economic, social, digital and spiritual restrictions that shape the everyday lives of families stretched between Malawi and South Africa. Confinement is something that individual family members experience and negotiate differently, but also together as families across borders, within walls, and in the presence of both opportunity and dangers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This part of the larger ZA-MAL project will examine how Malawian labor migrants experience, negotiate, and understand confinement &#8211; both as a family and individually &#8211;  within different social context either within or across borders. To achieve this, the following research questions will be explored:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>How is confinement experienced by different family members through work, borders, and household responsibilities?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>What are the structures that maintain, reproduce, and manage cycles of confinement?<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>What forms of everyday resistance or adaptation do families employ to counter social and economic restrictions?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>South Africa and Malawi: Translocal confinement Who leaves Malawi? How do they survive South Africa? and how are they experiencing translocal confinement across Lilongwe and Cape Town?&nbsp; These are questions the ZA-MAL team will explore. &nbsp; For more than a century, Malawians have migrated in their thousands to South Africa. Translocal bonds have been created, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-6127","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6127"}],"version-history":[{"count":100,"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6829,"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6127\/revisions\/6829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/confined-erc.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}