This evocative book tells of the lives and experiences of 22 black South African women - all born in the 1900s - from one small town in the Western Transvaal. The women seem both ordinary and remarkable as we follow their lives through childhood and schooling, work in the city, marriage and family life, participation in urban resistance, and ultimate return to Phokeng by the 1980s.

This book's originality and power lies in the central place it gives to the oral histories on which it is based. This richly textured study gives us a uniquely qualitative insight into the lives and world views of black South African women.