ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the emergence of a form of historical consciousness among the Omaheke Ju/'hoansi of the western Kalahari desert, in eastern Namibia. Edwin Wilmsen was the first anthropologist to grapple with the implications of sustained historical contact between hunter-gatherers and others in the Kalahari. Namibia's Omaheke Region lies on the western edge of Kalahari. It stretches northwards from the town of Gobabis, through two hundred kilometres of commercial ranch land into the vast Hereroland East communal area, the one-time native reserve of the primarily pastoralist Herero and Mbanderu peoples. Despite the myriad theoretical problems to afflict historical anthropology many anthropologists and historians alike remain wedded to the possibility of a concrete history and theoretical sabre rattling notwithstanding, the Kalahari Debate is ultimately about 'concrete history'. A trend in post-colonial African scholarship has been to view all societies as historical.
