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Forsaken Place

I photographed these young girls skipping at an abandoned goldmine hostel that is home to them and many poor families on the outskirts of Johannesburg, South Africa. In the previous few weeks before this photograph was taken, the area had been robbed of all its cable (stolen for its copper) so no one had electricity anymore. Ironically, the girls were using the casing from stolen cable to skip with. Violence and sexual violence against girls and women in South Africa is widely recognized to have reached levels among the highest in the world and is particularly high in the impoverished shanty towns and squatter camps like this abandoned hostel.

Filename
Forsaken_Place.jpg
Copyright
Julia Cumes
Image Size
5552x3702 / 2.3MB
Contained in galleries
Invisible Selves--Exploring Female Identity and Experience
I photographed these young girls skipping at an abandoned goldmine hostel that is home to them and many poor families on the outskirts of Johannesburg, South Africa. In the previous few weeks before this photograph was taken, the area had been robbed of all its cable (stolen for its copper) so no one had electricity anymore. Ironically, the girls were using the casing from stolen cable to skip with. Violence and sexual violence against girls and women in South Africa is widely recognized to have reached levels among the highest in the world and is particularly high in the impoverished shanty towns and squatter camps like this abandoned hostel.