Ginsburg (landscape architecture, U. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign), who lived in Johannesburg in the late 1980s and early 1990s, saw black women employed as domestic workers everywhere in suburban neighborhoods. In this ethnographic study, she presents an interview-based picture of the realities of life under apartheid policies for these domestics. Reminiscent of the popular book and film The Help about black domestics in the US South, the book includes photographs of the back rooms in which they lived to provide services "invisibly" in their white employers' homes. Annotation 2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
