Blog | Future Pasts

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Feb 17

Future Pasts and a new research project on Etosha-Kunene histories in Namibia

The Future Pasts project has contributed to a new research grant – one of 19 from more than 170 applications submitted in February 2019 t...

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Sian Sullivan

Dec 19, 2019

Celebrating Hildegaart |Nuas of Sesfontein - 90 years still dancing

On 21 December 2019 the people of Sesfontein / !Nani-|aus in north-west Namibia celebrate the 90th year of an elder of their community - ...

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Sian Sullivan

Dec 19, 2019

Giving back

By Chris Low In May 2019 I wound up my Future Pasts research by heading back to the Sorris Sorris and Sesfontein Conservancies with the a...

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Sian Sullivan

Jul 4, 2019

Future Pasts exhibition curated in Namibia

Swakopmund residents from Sesfontein visiting our research exhibition on 15 June 2019. Back left are Future Pasts researchers Mike Hannis...

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Sian Sullivan

Oct 16, 2018

Crossing continents with Future Pasts: a tale of three conferences

Sian Sullivan (L) and Welhemina Suro Ganuses (R) present 'Tasting the lost flute music of Sesfontein: histories, continuities, possibilit...

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Rick Rohde

Jun 14, 2018

Hanging on a Wire, edited by Rick Rohde, Wins Best Non-Fiction Edited Volume in South African Award

“Hanging on a Wire: Photographs by Sophia Klaase” was shortlisted for, and subsequently won, the 2018 Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS...

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Chris Low

Mar 18, 2018

Storytelling at Sorris Sorris

Louise ||Areses tells where the folk figure Haiseb came from. Photo: Sylvia Diez, Sorris Sorris, March 2016. In 2016 I was collecting Kho...

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Mike Hannis and Sian Sullivan

Mar 4, 2018

Extraction old and new: mining the desert in southwestern Africa

At the extreme southern tip of Africa in 1652, the world’s first trans-national corporation began establishing a new port. The powerful D...

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Sian Sullivan

Sep 25, 2017

Damara King's Festival Film shortlisted for major Research in Film Award

Press Release! A film made by the Future Pasts research project led from Bath Spa University’s Research Centre for Environmental Humaniti...

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Rick Rohde

Sep 14, 2017

The wonder of digital archives

On Monday 11 September 2017, I attended SCOLMA’s (Standing Conference on Library Materials on Africa) annual conference at the National L...

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Sian Sullivan

Jul 22, 2017

Future Pasts exhibition hosts private view (and is visited by a special guest!)

On Tues 18th July, the Future Pasts research project hosted a private view of our exhibition Future Pasts: Landscape, Memory and Music in...

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Rick Rohde, Timm Hoffman

Jul 9, 2017

Climate change complexity: repeat landscape photographs of the Pro-Namib and Namib Desert

by Rohde, R., Hoffman, M.T., Jack, S. and Sullivan, S. The above composite image illustrates a key method we are drawing on in Future Pas...

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Sian Sullivan

Mar 19, 2017

‘Our hearts were happy here’ - recollecting acts of dwelling and acts of clearance through oral hist

It was when doing field research for my PhD in the mid-1990s that I first learned of local histories embedded in the broader landscape ar...

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Rick Rohde with Sian Sullivan

Feb 14, 2017

Outsider photography/insider ethnography: writing ourselves out of the picture?

In November 2016 the Contemporary Ethnography Across the Disciplines (CEAD) Conference took place in Cape Town. The conference focus was ...

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Chris Low

Feb 5, 2017

Tracking Haiseb in west Namibia

Perhaps it should be unsurprising that tracking such a slippery character as ‘Haiseb’ is proving less straightforward than I initially im...

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Angela Impey

Dec 19, 2016

Future Pasts ethnomusicologist works with BBC journalist to create radio programme on the Damara Kin

At the beginning of November, Angela Impey went to Namibia with the acclaimed BBC journalist, Robin Denselow, to make a radio documentary...

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Sian Sullivan

Sep 23, 2016

Why are pastoralists poisoning lions in west Namibia?

Imagine that years of drought have forced you to graze your cattle on sparse grass in the open desert, far from permanent settlements. Th...

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Sian Sullivan

Nov 19, 2015

Notes on ‘Natural Capital’ and ‘fairy-tales’

Next week, on the 23-24th November, the World Forum on Natural Capital takes place for a second time in Edinburgh. Given some of its fram...

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