Analysis Of We Gotta Number There

Throughout history, racial injustice has played a huge role. Especially in South Africa, where an institutional system called apartheid was established in 1948 to promote racial segregation between the country’s original inhabitants, the black South Africans, and the country’s immigrants, the white South Africans. The system favoured the white population greatly which is exactly what the Mbulus, a black South African family of three, experiences in Rayda Jacobs’ short story “We Gotta Number There”, which was published in 2004.
This essay will analyse and interpret the short story with focus on the relationship between the two families and the ending of the short story. It is a sunny day when the Cooks, a white South African family of two, and the Mbulus, a black South African family of three, meet for the first time. Jonas Mbulu, the husband of Lucky Mbulu and the father of Shona Mbulu, heard about a job opening as a gardener from one of his neighbours, Cyril, who worked as a gardener at the Cooks residence previously, but he was fired due to stealing. Jonas, who wanted to make sure to be the first to apply for the job, climbed over the Cooks’ wrought iron gate, which shocks the Cooks greatly. This leads to a tense atmosphere between the two families but when Jonas shows his recommendations to Richard Cook, the atmosphere instantly becomes more relaxed, which marks the beginning of the relationship between the two families.
As the weeks progress, Jonas proves to