Camalita Naicker holds a PhD in Historical Studies from the University of Cape Town and an MA in Political Studies from Rhodes University where she was a research student at the Unit for the Humanities at Rhodes University (UHURU). Part of her MA and PhD, course work was conducted at the Centre for African Studies (UCT) and the Centre for Political Studies (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi) respectively. She believes in interdisciplinary approaches to the study of history, and she also holds a Bachelor of Journalism degree and an Honours in African Languages from Rhodes University.

Camalita currently holds a National Research Foundation, Thuthuka Research Grant, titled, Beyond the Rural and the Urban: New Research Agendas in South African Labour History. She is the South African contributor to the Feminist Africa’s 21st Century Feminist Social Movements and Struggles Research and Publishing Project. She also serves as a book reviews editor for the South African Historical Journal. 

Research Interests and Areas of Supervision:

Camalita’s research is interested in the intersections amongst cultural, economic, and social histories in the study of migrant labour, popular politics, and gender in nineteenth and twentieth century South African history.

Select publications:

Journal Articles

  • Naicker, Camalita. "Gendered Boundaries: Feminist Politics and Popular Struggles in South Africa." Feminist Africa 5, no. 1 (2024): 23-49
  • Unpacking the role of women in community struggles. South African Labour Bulletin. July/August. 2018.
  • The Languages of Xenophobia in Post-Apartheid South Africa: Reviewing Migrancy, Foreignness and Solidarity. Agenda. Volume 30, No.2 Pp46 -60. 2016.
  • Broadening Conceptions of Democracy and Citizenship: The Subaltern Histories of Rural Resistance in Mpondoland and Marikana. (with Sarah Bruchhausen. Journal of Contemporary African Studies. Volume 34, No. 2. 2016. Pp, 388-403
  • #feesmustfall: The praxis of popular politics in South Africa. Urbanisation. Vol. 1.  No.1. 2016. Pp. 53-61
  • The Politics of Specificity: Marikana and the Subaltern, Economic and Political Weekly. Volume, L. No24. 2015. Pp, 99-107.
  • Worker Struggles as Community Struggles: The Politics of Protest in Nkaneng, Marikana, Journal of African and Asian Studies. Volume, 51, No.2. 2016. Pp. 157-170.

Book Chapters

  • “Broadening Conceptions of Democracy and Citizenship: The Subaltern Histories of   Rural Resistance in Mpondoland and Marikana” in Land Reform Revisited: Democracy, State Making and Agrarian Transformation in Post Apartheid South Africa. Ed. Femke Brandt and Grascian Mkodzongi. Brill Press: Leiden. 2018. Pp. 15-37.
  • The Politics of Representation in Marikana: A tale of competing ideologies, in Lesley Cowling and Carolyn Hamilton (ed), Babel Unbound. 2020. Pg. 183 – 215
  • "Rethinking Representations of Trade Unionism in South Africa," The Oxford Handbook of South African History, ed. Daniel Magaziner, (online edn, Oxford Academic, 8 June 2020), 1-30 https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190921767.001.0001

Other Publications