12 Dec 2024

Part one of the six part documentary film series, A Kalahari Family, was showcased on Tuesday at the Art Residency Centre (ARC). 

Facilitated by Thebe Radiakwana, the founder of Serati Films, A Kalahari Family summarises years of decades of the indigenous people in the Kalahari Desert. 

Written and directed by John Marshall, in the film, the audience witnesses the evolution of Marshall from naïve, inexperienced teenager engaging on unusual inherent cultural practices of the indigenous community he was staying with. 

The documentary is a narration through the voices of Toma Tsamkxao and his family taking the viewers on a journey of their self-sufficient hunter-gatherers life. 

The film also takes the viewer to the years when the western oppressively influenced the indigenous people of the Kalahari to stay away from their traditional simple way of life. 

Produced by Marshall’s parents, the film is a story of struggle against the myths and misconceptions about the indigenous Kalahari community. 

And, in this series, the indigenous people are given a chance to clear such misconceptions of the so-called wild primitive Kalahari people. They give viewers an understanding that, whilst they as the indigenous might accentuate to civilisation, however, they still wish to hold on to their traditional practices.  

A Kalahari Family screening came on International Human Rights Day and when the body of Pitseng Gaoberekwe of Metsiamanong was finally laid to rest in his ancestral home. 

It is through this film that issues unbeknown about the indigenous people of the Kalahari come to light. 

Viewers get to appreciate some of the practices, which are effectively carried out in their ancestral Kalahari Desert, and otherwise would not be effective outside that birth land. 

One of the scenes showed how the boys transitioned into manhood eventually seen as ready to marry, where the different cuts on the body are performed specifically for purposes of hunting.

 It shows how they knew of when to hunt and when to migrate to another place and again back after some time, in their nomadic life. 

According to the film, released in 2002, back then before the indigenous people were diluted, boys will not get married if they did not go through the cut ritual, which gives them wisdom and power to hunt animals. 

Furthermore, the film examines the cultural tourism from the angle of the tourist as well as the community as providers of tourism. Ends