Out Of Bounds
Cultural Conflict
How do you know what’s right?
Cultural Conflict
Knowing about the area’s history and
culture can be helpful when reading a
story set in another country
Cultural conflict: is a struggle that arises
because of the different values,
customs, or circumstances between
groups of people
This story takes place in South Africa
Apartheid
was a system of legal racial segregation
enforced by the National Party
government in South Africa between
1948 and 1994, under which the rights
of the majority 'non-white' inhabitants
of South Africa were curtailed and
minority rule by white people was
maintained.

ref: wikipedia
Squatters
Are people who take over public land
and stay there, where they set up their
own homes
Background
 Cities in Post-Apartheid South Africa
 The passage of the Groups Areas Act in 1950
led to the segregation of the business and
residential areas of South African cities and
towns. Africans, “coloureds”, and Asians were
forced to live on reserves, or “homelands,”
which were designated for each ethnic group.
Most of these were established far from
South Africa’s major cities. Non-whites also
lived on the periphery of the cities in
segregated public housing called “townships.”
People were crowded into very small areas
relative to the size of their populations, and
most residents experienced high
unemployment and poor living conditions.
After apartheid ended, people were free
to live wherever they wished. Huge
numbers of people moved to the cities
from rural areas, hoping to find jobs
and better quality of life. The cities,
however, were not prepared for these
migrants. Because of a severe shortage
of affordable housing, the migrants built
squatter’s camps, where many still live
in unsanitary conditions and without
clean water.
In some cases, the government has
been forced to supply housing to
squatters. Unfortunately, this housing is
often far from the urban areas where
most of the jobs are found.
Comprehension
 1) Squatters have taken over the land where
Rohan’s hideout used to be.
 2) Rohan has seen Solani in the street with
his wire cars.
 3)Sketches should show the solidity of
Rohan’s house and the temporary nature of
the camp. They should also show Rohan’s
house on top of the hill and the camp below
it.
Literary Analysis
 5)Cultural Conflict: Causes of discrimination:
legacy of apartheid-Indians and Africans
mostly live separately; high crime rates –
residents worry that having poor people
nearby will increase crime; neighborhood
crimes – residents think the squatters’ camp
is the source of these crimes; competition for
resources - residents resent the squatters
asking for water.
 6) Rohan’s parents display signs of prejudice
toward the squatters, although his mother has
some sympathy for the poor and seems to
have good intentions. (She gives them water
and thinks something should be done to help
them.) His father, however, expresses no
sympathy. He builds the garden wall higher
and discourages his son from helping the
poor. The squatters also show signs of
prejudice against Rohan when they make
negative assumptions about him.
Vocabulary in Context
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
[d] stroll
[b] distract
[d] excess
[b] free
[a] maroon
[d] everyone
[b] lead
[d] weakly
Vocabulary Strategy: Homographs
1. group
2. herded
3. wrinkled
4. circular openings in the centers of
the irises
5. cattle
Denotation: A word’s denotation is its
dictionary definition.
Connotation: A word’s connotations are
the ideas and feelings associated with
the word, as opposed to its dictionary
definition. For example, the word
mother, in addition to its basic meaning
(“a female parent”), has connotations of
love, warmth, and security.