Lifescaping’ toxicants: Locating and living with e-waste in Tanzania

Abstract

Based on fieldwork in an informal scrap recycling workshop, this article explores how unregulated electronic waste (e-waste) handling activities in Dar es Salaam expose workers to toxic substances as part of their livelihoods. These informal economic activities are situated in the urban landscape within the surrounding global flows of e-waste and recycling and demonstrate how workers reflect on and seek to mitigate the toxic exposures they encounter as part of daily life. The concept ‘lifescaping’ is used to show how, while informal workers may be aware of toxic exposures and make the best of tricky situations in various ways, they have limited access to information about the dangers and must develop their own strategies by performing various micro-actions through which they hope to protect themselves.