San

Group of peoples now living mainly in and around the Kalahari Desert region of southern Africa, chiefly Botswana, Namibia, and northwestern South Africa. They are closely related to the Khoekhoe. San languages belong to the Khoisan family. Two well-known San groups are the !Kung (Ju) and the | Gui.

The San are, for the most part, physically indistinguishable from the Khoekhoe or from their Bantu-speaking neighbours. Traditional San society centres on the nomadic band of related families. San shelters are semicircular structures of branches, twigs, and grass; their equipment is portable, their possessions few and light. They have traditionally hunted, using bows and snares, and gathered wild vegetables, fruits, and nuts. Numbering in the tens of thousands, most San have been restricted, because of historical and political factors, to harsh, semiarid areas, and they work for wages on European farms or serve other Africans, notably the Tswana.