!Aitsa

This film takes us to the Karoo, a desert in South Africa the size of Germany. In 2018, construction of a gigantic telescope started here, with which contemporary scientists will look back in time in search of answers about the origin of the universe. 

What does this cosmic hunger for knowledge do to the original population who have inhabited this pristine land for centuries? And how does modern science relate to the ancient knowledge of the residents about this place and its history? !Aitsa is a grand story about high-tech science, ancient spiritual knowledge and colonial history. 

TALK “Khore hare” means welcome in the Khoekhoegowab language – that is spoken in this film. Bradley van Sitters (University of Cape Town) gives us a short KhoiKhoi language course. He is the initiator of the first certified foundational Khoekhoegowab course in South Africa, designed to revitalise the ancestral language. He will explain the importance of intergenerational transmission of marginalised languages for preservation of Indigenous lives and knowledge. And how the Dutch colonisation of the Western Cape made people lose their language, and thereby their relation to the land.  

Language: English