The Gods Must Be Crazy

8 Pages 2085 Words

n though there are about 70,000 Bushmen in southern Africa, by some reports only about one third of them continue their traditional nomadic lifestyles. Many of them were kidnapped and made to work in people’s homes and on farms. But because they were paid no wages, only food, they are very poor.
The San people are short and slim with kinky hair described as “peppercorn”. The San call themselves Zhu Twa Si, “the harmless people,” in contrast to non-San, whom they call Zosi, “animals without hooves,” meaning they are as dangerous as predator animals. The San are descendants of the original inhabitants of Angola. Bantu groups began to expand into their area by 1000 AD and easily dominated the harmless people.
The languages of the San are also referred to as San. There are various names of the various forms of the language spoken by the different groups. These are “click” languages, as members of the San language family. The exclamation point represents one of the click sounds. The people in the San group speak the following languages: Akhoe, Kung - Ekoka, Kung – Gobabis, Kung – Tsumkwe and Oung. These languages, together with Vasekela and Maligo, make up the northern division of the southern African Khoisan languages. Many also speak the Tswana language and some speak English. Afrikaans is commonly spoken by many men in Namibia. Portuguese would be needed in Angola. These two languages would be the languages of education in the respective countries.
The San languages are distantly related to the languages spoken by the Khoikhoin, also called Khoi or Hottentots. Some of the San neighbors also speak Khoi languages. Some of the unusual click sounds of these languages have been borrowed by a group of Bantu la...