Seeing in the suburbs

In China Miéville's acclaimed science-fiction novel The City & the City two different cities exist side by side, in the same physical space, but with residents of each primed not to see or acknowledge the residents, spaces and components of the other. 'Subtly, almost casually, Miéville constructs a metaphor for modern life in which our habits of "unseeing" allow us to ignore that which does not directly affect our familiar lives' (Moorcock 2009). Recognising the diverse ways in which this fictional idea could capture the social spaces of many contemporary cities, we reflect in this piece on one aspect of the notion of seeing and not seeing particular impacts of the coronavirus pandemic, from two similar urban localities in two different cities in two different countries: South Africa and the UK. The reflections are embedded within the historical and structural conditions of each national context as well as their distinct responses to the pandemic.