"Contrasting, beautiful Namibia," sings the Namibian national anthem. It is indeed a land of contrasts and beauty, both natural and cultural. The environment ranges from the densely populated, palm-dotted plain of Ovamboland to the arid hills of the central highlands, and from the lush forest savanna of the Kavango and Caprivi to the dunes that roll the length of Namibia's cold desert coast. Among Namibia's diverse population one finds pastoralists, subsistence farmers, and a growing urban middle class.
Namibia boasts eleven national languages, of which most Namibians speak two or three. Although English is Namibia's official language, it is the first language of very few Namibians. The languages WorldTeach colleagues and students speak, and their level of English skill, depend largely on the school's location. Volunteers will teach entirely in English.
For all its diversity, a spirit of cooperation characterizes Namibia. Today, almost twenty years after gaining independence from South Africa, Namibia stands out as country marked with remarkable progress and promise. This atmosphere of cooperation has allowed Namibia to concentrate its resources on basic needs, and education has been a top priority.
Click here to read more about Namibia's history, culture and geography, as written by a former WorldTeach field director.
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"The culture here is more flavorful and wonderfully explosive than any other I have encountered!"
Brittan Horton,
Namibia Year
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Web Resources for Namibia
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Almost every day I'm blown away by the pinks, oranges, and purples of a sky that looks absolutely as gorgeous as the sun sets over palm trees, wild grasses and wide open landscapes. Sometimes it reminds me of an illustration from a fairy tale I read as I child.
Elisa Mandell, Namibia Volunteer
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Contrasting, Beautiful Namibia : The Setting, Its People, and Their History
Written by Vince O'Hara, WorldTeach Field Director, 2003
Namibia is among the driest, least densely populated, and most naturally wild countries on the planet. It is bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana and Zimbabwe to the east, Zambia and Angola to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean Namibia's physical and social landscape. Close offshore the cold Benguela Current keeps ocean moisture from rising high enough to form clouds, resulting in thick layers of fog that nourish desert-adapted life hundreds of kilometers inland. The only rainfall most of Namibia receives comes during the summer months, when tropical moisture is drawn south from the Congo Basin. Two deserts thus dominate the topography, the Namib along the coast and the Kalahari in the east
Scattered across this desiccated land, which is twice the area of California, is an abundant array of wildlife, particularly in the central highlands, the desert littoral, the Etosha Pan, and the northeastern river systems; and a mere 1.8 million people, who speak 21 different languages and major dialects of Bantu, Khoekhoe, San, or Germanic origin. Namibia's highest population densities occur near reliable water sources. Some 40% of Namibians live within the Cuvelai System, a network of shallow channels, or oshanas, that flood after heavy rains in southern Angola. Other peoples in the north have settled close to the Zambezi, Kwando, Kavango, and Kunene Rivers, four of Namibia's five perennial rivers. Settlements have risen in the south close to springs and wells, including the capital Windhoek, originally named /Ai //Gams (meaning "firewater" in Nama ) for the steam emanating from the area's many hot springs.
In Namibia a cloudburst can mean the difference between life and death. Agriculturalists across the north, dependant on abundant rain in the summer to succor their crops, lose a year's labor when the rains fail. Cattle, goat, and sheep growers in the south are constantly conscious of the availability of grazing for their livestock. Some years one farmer gets plenty of rain and has tall grass, while his neighbor doesn't get any and has nothing but sand and camel-thorn brush for his stock. Water scarcity is a serious threat to Namibia's urban development. For instance, it's not uncommon for Windhoek to be only months away from the total depletion of its water supply. Of the ethno- linguistic groups currently resident in Namibia, the San are believed to have arrived first. Namibia was their exclusive hunting and gathering ground for centuries before the Bantu migration reached Namibia in the 1500's. At that time the Herero and Owambo moved south from Angola into northern Namibia. The Herero took to pasture inthe western mountains, while the Owambo cultivated the Cuvelai System. In the 1700's the Herero expanded southward into the central highlands. Around that time the Kavango communities arrived in the northeast to cultivate the fertile Kavango River valley. Then the Khoekhoe migration from South Africa began in earnest. Driven off their land by European settlers, the Nama moved into southern Namibia in the 1740's. The westernized Oorlam Nama followed in the early 1800's, as did the mixed-race Basters in the 1870's. By then the cattle wars between and among the various Herero and Nama bands were in full swing, as decent pastures became increasingly scarce. Into this fray arrived European traders and missionaries. The Germans formalized colonial rule in 1890, naming it German South West Africa, which prompted an influx of land- hungry German settlers.
The Germans quickly established their dominance in central Namibia, forcing the Herero and the Nama to put aside their differences and join arms. The wars that followed from 1904 to 1909 resulted in the extermination of 80% of the Herero population and the subjugation of all local resistance to German rule. The Germans in Namibia were defeated shortly thereafter when the Union of South Africa took the territory in 1915 on behalf of the British Empire as part of the First World War. In 1920 the League of Nations gave South Africa a mandate to rule South West Africa, which the United Nations subsequently revoked in 1966 after determining that South Africa was not administering the territory in the best interest of its people.
After the Afrikaner Nationalist Party came to power in South Africa in 1948, they instituted apartheid, an elaborate system that formalized and strengthened policies regarding the separation of races and ethnic groups. In Namibia as in South Africa, separate bureaucracies were established to rule each race and ethnic group, all answerable to the white territorial governor and ultimately the South African government in Pretoria. The white administration was funded well, while coloreds (people of mixed race descent) received less, and black ethnic administrations still less. The races were separated geographically, with town centers reserved for whites while coloreds and blacks were separated out of sight on the outskirts of towns. Each black ethnic group had its own "homeland," which amounted to the lands whites didn't want. People were forced to have special permits to leave their homelands or travel through parts of town "not their own".
In 1966 the South West Africa People's Organization (SWAPO) launched its armed struggle against apartheid South Africa. It was a low-intensity guerilla insurgency, backed by the Communist Bloc. With the withdrawal of the Portuguese from Angola in 1975, and the subsequent rise to power of the Soviet-backed MPLA in Luanda, the United States cast its support behind the anti-communist forces in the region, including the Angolan rebel group UNITA and apartheid South Africa. The U.S. support for the anti-communist forces was strengthened when tens of thousands of Cuban forces landed in Angola and successfully turned back a South African invasion. Burnt by the Cold War's heat was the struggle for Namibia's independence. Although the U.S. supported independence for Namibia and established mechanisms for achieving it through the U.N. in 1978, it did not want to cede the territory to communist influence. Not until 1988 was a resolution finally negotiated. The Cubans would withdraw from Angola and then the independence process defined in 1978 would be implemented.
Namibia became independent on March 21, 1990. Sam Nujoma, the leader of SWAPO in exile since 1960, was elected president by an overwhelming majority, and SWAPO won a majority of seats in the new National Assembly. Since independence this coterie of once-exiled SWAPO leaders has run Namibia with tremendous public support. The constitution is democratic and widely considered one of the most progressive national charters in history. The government has pursued free market economics, is successfully courting foreign investment, and has invested up to a third of its GDP into education. Thanks to an abundance of the finest diamonds found anywhere, rich marine resources, and a stable tax base, Namibia has remained free of debt entrapment, and has maintained its economic infrastructure well.
While to date Namibia is a success story amidst post-colonial African tragedies, there are challenges that Namibia still has to face. Land needs to be redistributed fairly and in a sustainable manner. Violent land grabs and the destruction of the agricultural economy, as has occurred in Zimbabwe, must be avoided. Discontent with SWAPO, when it does manifest itself into a viable challenge to the ruling party, will have to be managed democratically, without resorting to destructive populist rhetoric and violence. The country will have to further industrialize, for despite its low population density, the land cannot support an expansion of subsistence agricultural. Namibia will have to balance industrialization with water scarcity and a fragile environment. And Namibia will have to overcome the impact of AIDS, which has infected approximately 20% of all Namibian adults. Underpinning Namibia's potential to successfully meet these challenges is education. While over 80% of Namibians are literate, the quality of education for most Namibians remains poor. More Namibians will have to be empowered by education in order for them to overcome the economic, political, and social hurdles that lie in their way.
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