From November 2011 to October 2012 I interned with the Kalahari People’s Fund in Austin, Texas, which gave me the opportunity to travel to Namibia and Botswana during the summer of 2012.
While doing a project on the role of women in hunter-gatherer San culture for my Peoples and Cultures of Africa class, Dr. Agwuele recommended that I look up an anthropologist named Megan Biesele who was working as both a scholar and an activist on behalf of the San ethnic group. I read her book on San folklore, Women Like Meat, and researched her organization based in Austin, Texas.
The members of the Harvard Kalahari Research Group founded the Kalahari People’s Fund in 1973. The group composed of interdisciplinary researchers including an ethnographic filmmaker, archaeologists, ethnographers and evolutionary anthropologists, became famous for their contribution to our contemporary understanding of socio-economic egalitarianism as a survival strategy for modern hunter-gatherers.
After a few emails asking if KPF needed any volunteer work over the course of a couple of years, Dr. Biesele finally got back to me and we met up for lunch. In this case my persistence paid off: you have nothing to lose by asking and everything to gain. By the time I first met Dr. Biesele I already had a résumé full of volunteer experience which demonstrated that I was serious about community advocacy.
From November 2011 to June 2012 my primary duty at KPF was to answer emails that came into the organization, and I executed this largely through telecommute from my home in San Marcos beginning in November 2011. This process took anywhere from a week to two weeks depending on the amount of research required. Given that a large percentage of the emails were from documentary filmmakers, it was clear that the San remain to be a salient visual symbol in today’s public discourse. The idea of the San put forward by those requesting information was one reminiscent of the John Marshall or Gods Must Be Crazy films. The continued interest in the San’s hunting and gathering subsistence strategy depicted in popular Western media and scholarship between 1950 and 1980, demonstrates issues inherent in the presentation of the ethnographic present when today it is a but a representation of the of the ethnographic past. I found that most of my work for KPF was concerned with deconstruction of these antiquated, and arguably racist, representations.
While interning for Dr. Biesele, an opportunity arose for me to apply for an undergraduate research grant from the National Science Foundation. This grant was what allowed me to continue interning for KPF and made a trip to Namibia possible. Prior to leaving the country, I had several meetings with Dr. Biesele’s head technical assistant and she instructed me on the procedural aspects of working with the JTG. In the process I became familiar with ELAN transcription software, Audacity sound editing software, and DropBox, a cloud service. I was also in charge of handling and operating the audio recording equipment while Dr. Biesele compiled her research in the field, and so spent time prior to the trip acquainting myself to how it worked. Other routine preparations included everything from weekly language lessons to instruction to enduring a slew of immunizations (and nearly fainting in the nurse’s office).
Once in Tsumkwe, Namibia, I had the opportunity to work closely with the members of the Ju|’hoan Transcription Group, which is KPF’s most active ongoing project. The JTG is funded through grants and donations to KPF.
Kalahari Peoples Fund was a shining example of the marriage between knowledge and resources, and this internship has reaffirmed my belief that good development takes ethnographic understanding. It has also taught me to maintain ethnographic-sized expectations. If you decide you want to make a difference, all you can do is use your best judgment and be prepared for the unintended consequences that may arise. This ethnographic-sized focus to development has meant that in the renowned egalitarian culture of the San, some ethnic groups (or dialects) are favored over others. However, to do nothing is worse and generates hostility.
Since readjusting to America, I have found a paid internship with Consumer Report working in their activist development department on a story collection platform. I am most definitely attending graduate school in August of 2014 and hope to work with the San people in my future studies and career. Currently, I am looking for a Master’s program that would enable me to find high-level employment at a non-profit or development organization.