Bushman's Secret.

When South African filmmaker Rehad Desai travels to the Kalahari to investigate global interest in ancient Bushmen knowledge, he meets Jan van der Westhuizen, a fascinating Khomani San traditional healer. Jan's struggle to live close to nature is hampered by centuries of colonial exploitation of the San Bushmen and of their land. Unable to survive as they once did hunting and gathering, the Khomani now live in a state of poverty that threatens to see the last of this community forever. One plant could make all the difference. Hoodia, a cactus used by Bushmen for centuries, has caught the attention of a giant pharmaceutical company. It now stands to decide the fate of the Khomani San. Bushman's Secret features breathtaking footage of the Kalahari landscape, and exposes us to a world where modernity collides with ancient ways, at a time when each has, strangely, come to rely on the other. By the end of the 18th century, only 150 years after the arrival of the Dutch at the Cape of Good Hope, thousands of Bushmen (San) had been shot and killed, and many more were forced to work for their colonial captors. The new British government vowed to stop the fighting. They hoped to civilize the Bushmen by encouraging them to adopt a more agricultural lifestyle but were unsuccessful. By the 1870s the last Bushmen of the Cape were hunted to extinction. Other Bushman groups were able to survive the European encroachment despite continued threats. The last license to hunt Bushmen was reportedly issued in Namibia by the South African government in 1936. By the end of the 18th century, only 150 years after the arrival of the Dutch at the Cape of Good Hope, thousands of Bushmen (San) had been shot and killed, and many more were forced to work for their colonial captors. The new British government vowed to stop the fighting. They hoped to “civilize” the Bushmen by encouraging them to adopt a more agricultural lifestyle but were unsuccessful. By the 1870s the last Bushmen of the Cape were hunted to extinction. Other Bushman groups were able to survive the European encroachment despite continued threats. The last license to hunt Bushmen was reportedly issued in Namibia by the South African government in 1936.

With uplifted tongue.

Stories, Myths and Fables of the South African Bushmen, told in their manner by Arthur Markowitz in 1956. Artwork by Arthur Goldreich. The Bushmen of the Kalahari were first brought to the western world's attention in the 1950s by South African author Laurens van der Post with the famous book The Lost World of the Kalahari, which was also a BBC TV series. The 1980 comedy movie The Gods Must Be Crazy portrays a Kalahari Bushman tribe's first encounter with an artifact from the outside world (a Coke bottle). John Marshall (see Visual anthropology) documented the lives of bushmen in the Nyae Nyae region of Namibia over more than a 50 year period. His early film "The Hunters," released in 1957, shows a giraffe hunt during the 1950s. "N!Ai: The Story of a !Kung Woman," (1980) is the account of a woman who grew up while the Bushmen were living as autonomous hunter-gatherers and was later forced into a dependent life in the government created community at Tsumkwe . "A Kalahari Family" (2002) is a five-part, six-hour series documenting 50 years in the lives of the Ju/’hoansi of Southern Africa, from 1951 to 2000. In Wilbur Smith's The Burning Shore, the San people are portrayed through two major characters, O'wa and H'ani, and the bushmen's struggles, history and beliefs are touched upon in great detail. The Burning Shore is a volume in the Courtney's of Africa series. PBS's series "How Art Made the World" compares San cave painting 200 years ago to Paleolithic European painting 14,000 years old. Because of their similarities, the San can help us understand the reasons for ancient cave paintings. Lewis Williams believes that their trance states (traveling to the spirit world) are directly related to the reasons people went deep into caves, experienced sensory deprivation, and painted their visions onto the cave walls. The 2003 PBS documentary "Journey of Man" discusses a genetic analysis of the San, and asserts their blood contains the oldest genetic markers found on earth. These genetic markers are present on the y chromosome and are therefore passed down through thousands of generations in a relatively pure form. The documentary continues to trace these markers throughout the world, demonstrating that all of humankind can be traced back to the African continent and that the San are the last, most genetically unadulterated, remnant of humankind's ancient ancestors.

!Ora: A Language of Symphonic Clicks.

Yes, I salute you, you the sons of the sea, you who lie beyond the sea. I do not know you. I have not seen you with my eyes. You have not experienced me that you may know me, that you may realize that the people in this country speak a beautiful language (if I may say so to you, these Europeans catch and punish a man); so that you may also know that there are people living in this country. You do not know what nation we are. Listen, listen, just for once how they speak so that you should not again be ignorant. In turn I do not know your language as you do not know mine. I do not know your language you sons of the sea. Let me be happy, very happy. If you can do this you will be glad: actually there are people in that country. If you would say something, if you would write back, if you would write to these two Europeans a message for me. Yes, glad Europeans of the sea, if in turn you can give these Europeans a message, so that for my part I will be very happy about that matter. For this matter I beseech you. This, I don't know about you. Today you will get to know me through my tongue. Although you cannot see me with your own eyes we may see each other through God in heaven. Thus far I shall speak.