Contemporary Dynamics of Residential Practice and Social Relationships among the GÇ ui and GÇ ana San (Natural History of Communication among the Central Kalahari San)

Abstract

With the progress of sedentarisation policies in southern Africa, it has become difficult for San hunter-gatherers to live in freely established mobile residential units, called camps (Tanaka, 1980), as they once did. In the current situation, without creating a camp as an actual space for face-to-face interaction, how have the San reorganised their social relationships and their â belonging consciousness (Sugawara, 1988)â ? This question forms the focus of this paper. From the analysis of data of residential practices among GÇ ui- and GÇ ana-speaking San at a resettlement site in the Central Kalahari area of Botswana, it was concluded that relations based on the experience of previously shared camps frequently are still at the core of existing social relationships, despite the fact that the residential setting has significantly changed. Simultaneously, the flexibility of the forms of social grouping of the GÇ ui and GÇ ana is also demonstrated. This flexibility contributes to ameliorating tensions within the new community at the resettlement site.