THE KALAHARI KHOISAN

SUMMARY

A large number of Khoisan peoples are associated with a Kalahari environment one which they have occupied for many thousands of years. This ancient human occupation is reflected in the diversity of Khoisan languages, typical of so-called residual areas in the world, which are characterised by isolation and enormous time depths. The Khoisan are the essential human face of the Kalahari landscape and they have evolved practical systems to exploit its resources through foraging and hunting and to adapt to changing economic and social circumstances; they have also filled it with rich symbolic and spiritual systems to explain it all.