The Himba of Southwestern Africa and the Implications of the Nation State :: Essays Papers

The Himba of Southwestern Africa and the Implications of the Nation State For over five centuries, the Himba good deal have breathed the hot and filmy air of the Earths oldest desert, raising plunk down, prosperous herds of livestock in a shrewd electronic network of feed lands, and honoring their ancestors through ancient sacred bring ups and venerated grave sites (Crandall). Anthropologists cipher the Himbas ancestral firelight has been flickering . . . since the 1600s, when they arrived as part of the great Bantu migrations from the north (Salopek). unbekn stimulatest(predicate) to them, the arid and volatile beauty of Southwestern Africa has provided the Himba the worlds top hat cultural haven from violent confrontation and influence of foreign business office (Salopek). However, this desert haven is no longer a refuge from racial discrimination and environmental destruction in an ironic twist of history, the Himba atomic number 18 now threatened, not by European colo nists, but by their own Independent nation state presidential terms. In the past, foreign wars and encroaching westerly colonists left the Himba relatively untouched. However, globalization has wrought a new government mind in Namibia and Angola progress is profit at all cost, which translates to enormous tourism and unquestioned governmental river and land exploitation through overhasty damming projects. As both independent governments now urgently move towards westward ideals of ruthless progress, the international community must respond to Southwest Afrcias government proposals for Angolas Iona National Park and Namibias Epupa Falls Dam. 25,000 semi-nomadic Himba peasants, divide between Southern Angola and Northern Namibia boarders, now fight for their rights to choose the counselling of their future. In the struggle for Himba sovereignty, these two cases stand out as blaring war cries of Himba cultural and political rights under attack.Sme bed with otjize, a blend of but terfat and cater iron ochre for protection against the arid climate and blistering sun, the Himba are physically distinguishable as the Red People on the halcyon and brown landscape of Southwestern Africa ( Crandall). In scattered encampments or homesteads of 20 to 30 people the Himba drift with the seasons to new settlements in search of water and grazing lands (Bensman). Tending to semi-permanent gardens of maize, pumpkins, and melons, the Himba primarily live off the yogurt and butter fat of their livestock (Ezzell). As animals are sacred to the Himba, the passing of an elder is the only when momentous occasion for cattle to be slaughtered. By transferring ancestral fire to the exact place of burial, community life is physically and internally focus on on the fire.