Collection search - N!ai : The Story of a !Kung Woman

Record information – Brief

1

N!ai : The Story of a !Kung Woman

Item number (ISN):

163373

Hierarchical level:

Item (Accession level)

Date:

1980

Item number (ISN):

163373

Type of material:

Moving images

Found in:

Archives / Film, Video and Sound

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Record information – Details

Fonds/collection:

DOCUMENTARY EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES

Accession:

1983-0202

Media:

Film

Original title:

N!ai : The Story of a !Kung Woman

Part:

2 of 2

Production date:

1980

Production company:

Documentary Educational Resources
PB Associates

Production credit:

director/editor/producer/photography, John Marshall; director/editor, Adrienne Miesmer; producer, Sue Marshall-Cabezas; executive producer, Michael Ambrosino; photography, Ross McElwen; Mark Erder; translator, Letta Mbulu; field anthropologist, Patricia Draper

Description:

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A documentary film on the !Kung people, a group of San Juwasi (Bushmen) who live in the Kalahari desert of Namibia. Photographed over 27 years, from 1951 to 1978, the changes in !Kung society over three decades are portrayed through the intimate story of a young !Kung woman, N!ai. As N!ai recalls her childhood, she is shown acquiring the intricate knowledge involved in subsistance gathering through picking wild berries, nuts and roots with her mother. Further footage from the 1950s depict the careful skill of hunting giraffe with bows and arrows; the beauty of rainfall in the desert; and social customs of child marriage and healing through trance. The film then moves on to contempory scenes of Tshum!kwi, the South African government reservation, where N!ai receives rations of mealie meal for her five children. Gone are the days of hunting and gathering, and the film shows evidence of some of the cultural problems besetting the !Kung since the "coming of the white man": money and secrecy divide a formally communal and egalitarian community; tuberculosis is prevalent; and the South African Army recruits !Kung to fight the guerilla forces of the South West African People's Army (SWAPO). N!ai picks up a stringed instrument and the song she sings reveals the true feelings of her people - "Death is dancing me ragged" she sings. <59mn>

Language:

English

Notes:

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1. In the original language of the San the symbol indicated by the exclamation mark is a velar click.~2. This document is a voiceover English translation of N!ai speaking in the San language accompanied at times by English subtitles.

Detailed holdings information:

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Vault ISN:

155313

Format:

FILM

Location number:

8308-0034
8308-0035

Number of items:

2

Kind of sound:

COMP

Stock:

REL PRT

Made from:

DEPOSIT

Status:

MASTER

Vault ISN:

155314

Format:

VIDEO

Location number:

V1 8308-0026

Number of items:

1

Status:

REF
Ordering and viewing options

Conditions of access:

Open

Consultation copy number:

V1 8308-0026

Reproduction access:

with permission of Documentary Educational Resources

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