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Paper short abstract:

This article examines how artisanal and small-scale chromite miners in Zimbabwe generate tacit knowledge of geology, metallurgy, and resource extraction processes through their everyday practices and the use of vernacular and colloquial terms to describe different phenomena.

Paper long abstract:

This article examines how artisanal and small-scale chromite miners in Zimbabwe generate tacit knowledge of geology, metallurgy, and resource extraction processes through their everyday practices and the use of vernacular and colloquial terms to describe different phenomena. It argues that artisanal chromite miners’ mining practices are often framed by the uncertainties generated by the material qualities of the mineral resources. These include the nature of the mineral deposit (i.e stratiform, podiform, eluvial) as well as whether the seam is affected by faulting or not (healthy or terminally ill). The article argues that the vernacular and colloquial terms deployed by artisanal miners to describe specific geological features and mining processes demonstrate how geological factors and specific properties of mineral resources frame the socio-spatial practices of miners. The terms also evince artisanal miners’ understanding of the uncertainties that geological factors and material qualities of minerals generate. The article argues that artisanal and small-scale miners’ knowledge of the “behaviour” of chromite seams form an important part of their understanding of the world of resource extraction and the centrality of material qualities of minerals in the resource extraction processes. Overall, the article explores how artisanal and small-scale chromite miners play a critical role in the production of geological, metallurgical, and resource extraction knowledge and how this knowledge converge, diverge, and gets imbricated with ‘scientific’ knowledge.