The Symbolism Of District 9: Apartheid In South Africa

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Apartheid in South Africa was a racial segregation enforced through social and political systems by the National Party. During the apartheid, the rights of the blacks were reduced while the whites maintained and even strengthen their own. Blacks were forced to live in separate areas and were restricted regards to the use of public facilities. After the end of apartheid in 1994, the brutalities that the blacks of South Africa faced have been shown in various different forms, most notably movies. District 9 is a phenomenal movie that shows all species are not equal and never will be equal even if they are human. While the world was transitioning itself from colonialism and racial discrimination in the 1950s, South Africa started to impose racial …show more content…

The symbolic synopsis of the movie is more than three decades an alien ship is hovering over the city of Johannesburg, South Africa. The humans decide to break into the ship since nothing is apparently going in or coming out. Upon entering the ship, they end up finding the aliens, referred as “prawns," in a very unhygienic and unhealthy condition. Therefore, the humans decide to create a colony, or district, and provide them with shelter or food. However, the district has now turned into a slum where illegal crime takes place on a regular basis. In order to control the prawns and prevent crimes, the humans decide to shift them to another agency with better …show more content…

District 9 resembles district 6, which was in Cape Town, where about 60,000 inhabitants were evacuated. However, this movie shows the process that the agency was taking to evict the prawns from their shelters to new ones. Another critical factor that is presented in the movie is the condition of the district. There is litter everywhere, the prawns are being manipulated by local gangs, and there are strict laws for the prawns. District 9 turned into a slum where crime took its toll. This made the agency, that was appointed by major governments, to take care of the

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