ÿþ<!DOCTYPE html> <head> <meta charset="utf-8" /> <title>Kalahari Basin Area</title> <META NAME="description" CONTENT="Kalahari Basin area endangered language and population history research."> <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="kalahari, kalahari basin, kalahari basin area, khoisan, khoesan, bushman, bushmen, population history, endangered languages, khoisan languages, khoesan languages"> <META http-equiv="Content-Language" CONTENT="EN"> <link rel="icon" type="image/gif" href="graphics/kba.ico"></link> <link rel="shortcut icon" href="graphics/kba.ico"></link> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="style.css"> </head> <body id="about"> <div class="wrapper"> <div class="preheader"> </div> <div class="header"> <br> <table cellspacing="30"> <tr> <td width=700px><a href="http://www2.hu-berlin.de/kba/"><img src="graphics/heading.gif" alt="" align="left" height="80"></a></td> <td width=100px rowspan="2"><a href="http://www.hu-berlin.de/" target="_blank"><img src="graphics/hu.gif" align="right" height="80"></a></td> </tr> </table> <div class="nav"> <ul> <li><a href="http://www2.hu-berlin.de/kba/" id="aboutnav">About</a></li> <li><a href="projects.html" id="projectsnav">Projects</a></li> <li><a href="events.html" id="eventsnav">Events</a></li> <li><a href="publications.html" id="publicationsnav">Publications</a></li> <li><a href="languages.html" id="languagesnav">Languages</a></li> <li><a href="eurobabel.html" id="eurobabelnav">EuroBABEL</a></li> </ul> </div> </div> <!--START MAIN BODY CONTENT--> <div class="main_col"> <h1>The Kalahari Basin area: a 'Sprachbund' on the verge of extinction</h1><br> <table> <tr> <td> <p>The Kalahari Basin area project (KBA) is a group of linguists and social and molecular anthropologists working together on questions regarding the population history of non-Bantu-speaking peoples in southern Africa, otherwise known as <a href="languages.html">'Khoisan'</a>. Although Khoisan is regarded by some as a single language family, the KBA will investigate the hypothesis that the various language families in this area share traits due to extensive contact. The languages and culture of the people in the Kalahari Basin are rapidly dying out, thus the project additionally aims to conduct as much linguistic and anthropological documentation as possible before it is too late. The KBA project is made up of <a href="projects.html">six project teams</a> of scientists based at six different institutions and is funded by the <a href="eurobabel.html">European Science Foundation</a> and various other country-specific funding bodies.</p><br> </td> <td> <center> <img src="graphics/springbok.gif" width=450px> </center> </td> </tr> <tr align=right> <td></td> <td> <span class="small"> Drawing "Springbok" by Taa speaker Stefanus GainÂamseb </span> </td> </tr> </table> </div> <br class="clearer" /"> <!--END MAIN BODY CONTENT--> <div class="footer"> <span class="small"> For any queries, please email <a href="mailto:robyn.loughnane@staff.hu-berlin.de">robyn.loughnane@staff.hu-berlin.de</a><br> Copyright © 2011 Kalahari Basin Area Project; last modified 2 May 2012 </span> </div> </div> <script type="text/javascript"> var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-22269619-1']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })(); </script> </body> </html>