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Abstract

Waiting is often perceived as an inactive or static period and is
mostly linked to a hope for a better future among youth. This
paper pays special attention to older internally displaced persons
(IDPs) in Cameroon and how they use their experiences,
knowledge, and capabilities to create new livelihoods as they
‘wait’ to return to their original homes. Specifically, the paper
elucidates how ‘aged’ care for family members, create new jobs,
do old jobs in a new manner, or ‘do nothing’ at all. Special
attention is paid to the reconfiguration of family life and
relationships, as well as to gender roles and shifting
(in)dependencies. This paper goes beyond the notion of older
people as vulnerable, inactive or frail, and highlights that work
and activity at an older age generate new forms of mobility,
resources and new ideas about the future. Drawing on
ethnographic research among internally displaced families in
Bafoussam, the Francophone capital of the West region of
Cameroon, this paper illustrates that the condition of ‘waiting’ is
productively and actively shaped by Anglophone IDPs who
dynamically combine practices of the past with their present
status, as well as notions about their still-uncertain future.