Being Together in Mobility: Flexible Kinship and Conviviality in the Cape Town CBD - Paperback

This ethnographic study explores how diverse individuals encounter, interact, and share urban public space in the Cape Town CBD, specifically focusing on St. George's Mall. Using decolonial anthropological methods - including participant observation as a "flexible shop assistant" - the research investigates the complex relationships between people, products, and place. Nakamura characterises the street as a site of "constant circulation", where transnational and transregional mobility is a normal way of being. At the heart of this vibrant ecosystem is the concept of "flexible kinship", a practice where traders from various backgrounds form a "family" to survive economic precarity and navigate the daily anxieties of xenophobia. By embracing their "incompleteness", these street dwellers foster conviviality - an attitude of living together by balancing tensions rather than denying them. Ultimately, this work presents the urban street as a powerful metaphor for "open-ended belonging", offering a hopeful alternative to the exclusionary fortification often found in modern globalised cities.

"Grounded in the concepts of circulation and conviviality, Nakamura's ethnography offers a profound look at how we share space in a complex world. By treating the urban street as both a physical site and a powerful metaphor, this work illuminates how the fundamental relations of identity and security are shaped on the ground." - Ignasio Malizani Jimu, Associate Professor of Anthropology, Malawi University of Science and Technology

"Nakamura's keen attention to the unfolding sociality of the street provides a vital map of compassion, hope, and care. In urban environments too often dismissed as postcolonial necropolises - defined by extraction and predation - this book offers a hopeful, open-ended vision of conviviality. For its celebration of these paradoxes and the vibrant promise of life on the street, this work deserves a wide readership." - Bj rn Enge Bertelsen, Professor, Department of Social Anthropology, University of Bergen, Norway