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S-AFRIKA-Program for forskningsamarbeid med Sør- Afrika

Khoe-San Culture, Language and Memory in South Africa

Awarded: NOK 0.45 mill.

The project has two main components. One component comprises networking and research collaboration with regional universities with research profiles addressing Khoe-San/indigenous issues (e.g. University of Namibia, University of Botswana and the Univer sity of the Western Cape) and the University of Tromso, through the Department of Social Anthropology and the Centre for Saami Studies. These activities will contribute to the development of Khoe-San research competence and capacity at the University of t he Free State. The main collaborators in the Culture and Memory project will serve as a reference group for the research project, advise PhD students affiliated with the project, and carry out independent fieldwork as appropriate. The other component is a longitudinal interdisciplinary research project, involving anthropologists, historians and linguists, embedded in the network activities. The research will examine the nature and dynamics of Khoe-San culture, language, memory, identities and repres entations in South Africa. Drawing especially on data from the 1936 South African population census, which also enumerated Khoe-San language speakers, the project will seek remaining Khoe-San language speakers in the country (a number of whom have already come to the fore after 1994), as well as their immediate descendants, and record and analyse their cultural and linguistic memories and life histories. Their life histories should yield valuable insights into the historical dynamics of Khoe-San culture, language, identity and memory in South Africa. Their life histories and memories should also challenge widely held misconceptions about the Khoe-San heritage in South Africa, especially the view that the Khoe-San and their cultures and languages are long extinct. This perception has inclined those in positions of power, including academics, to neglect the living Khoe-San heritage.

Funding scheme:

S-AFRIKA-Program for forskningsamarbeid med Sør- Afrika