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The paper contends that subaltern urbanism is a way of life in the context of contemporary Zimbabwe. Through ethnography conducted in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, between February 2019 and May 2019, the paper extends the concept of subaltern urbanism through presenting subaltern urbanism as a way of life that encapsulates individuality and urban governance. The paper argues that subaltern urbanism is scripted by individuals positioned at the bottom of the social ladder and urban governing institutions. The paper maintains the view that subaltern urbanism as a way of life denotes redefinition and (re)imagining contemporary post-colonial urbanity. Finally, the paper proposes the notion that the author labels as "subalternization of the city" by urban governing institutions and suggests new ways of understanding urbanism in Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper contends that the covid-19 pandemic has reconfigured how cities manage urban marginality within Zimbabwe. The pandemic enabled cities to push everyday mundane practices away from the centre of the city to the margins of the cities through securitisation and criminalising informal activities within the centre. The paper's methodological underpinnings are hinged on a six month ethnography within Bulawayo (Zimbabwe's second largest city). The paper maintains the view that managing urban marginality in the context of covid-19 must be framed within the binary of two opposing forces – governing institutions (the government and municipality) and the low-income residents. Using covid-19 as a pretext of "curbing the pandemic" governing institutions have pushed informal economic activities from the centre through employing law and force; on the other hand low-income residents have found eclectic means to counteract the measures imposed to constrain their agency. Finally, the paper suggests that covid-19 has reconfigured how cities manage urban marginality through pushing everyday informal practices to the periphery and how the low-income residents deploy their agency to counteract confinement hence managing urban marginality can be understood as a two-way process involving governing institutions and the low-income residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]