Evictions, informal livelihoods, illegality, fear, public management and lack of collective control over the neighbourhood are defining features of daily life in the Johannesburg innercity neighbourhood of Yeoville. An area typifying many of the complexities, opportunities and struggles of urban life in the metropolis of Johannesburg, Yeoville as a site of communityoriented research was always likely to be challenging, engaging and fruitful. Considering and reshaping community expectations – such as identifying and mapping illegality, imagining integrated trading, aiding evictees and fighting slumlordism – required our team to consider, reflect upon and at times reshape these demands on our research. Through the Studio, Yeoville speaks to the challenges, opportunities and methodologies of community-oriented research.

Based in the School of Architecture and Planning at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Yeoville Studio was a community-oriented research initiative in the neighbourhood of Yeoville between 2010 and 2012. It was conducted in partnership with three civil society organisations, and involved a number of Wits University academics and students – from first-year undergraduates to PhD postgraduates. The professed aim of the Studio was to support community initiatives through a multi-disciplinary, intense research focus on Yeoville – an aim that was to be questioned and reframed throughout the conduct of the Studio, and that this book reflects upon. The Studio was conducted over a relatively short period – roughly two years – for practical reasons (we could not have generations of students study only Yeoville) but also because we initially conceived of our intervention as supporting existing or emerging community initiatives: we were wary of becoming a player in the local community game.

This initial conception was to be challenged, however. We did not know exactly what support we could provide, or to whose initiatives and requests we should respond.