Sigrid Schmidt
   HOME





Sigrid Schmidt
Sigrid Schmidt (birth name: Sigrid Matthäi) (born 12 July 1930) is a German folklorist,
KATALOG DER DEUTSCHEN NATIONALBIBLIOTHEK, biography data citing ''Hildesheimer Literaturlexikon von 1800 bis heute''
best known for her ''Afrika erzählt'' ("Africa Narrates") series. The ten volumes are tales (with extensive commentary) collected by the author from 1959-1962 and 1972-1997 (volumes 1 to 7 in German, volumes 8 to 10 in English), mostly in Namibia.


Biography

Born in Berlin, Sigrid Matthäi studied English and German literature at the Free University Berlin with a special interest in folklore,''Die vere van die duiwel'' by Sigrid Schmidt
an inter ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Namibia
Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the northeast, approximating a quadripoint, Zimbabwe lies less than 200 metres (660 feet) away along the Zambezi, Zambezi River near Kazungula, Zambia. Namibia's capital and largest city is Windhoek. Namibia is the driest country in sub-Saharan Africa, and has been inhabited since prehistoric times by the Khoekhoe, Khoi, San people, San, Damara people, Damara and Nama people. Around the 14th century, immigration, immigrating Bantu peoples arrived as part of the Bantu expansion. From 1600 the Ovambo people#History, Ovambo formed kingdoms, such as Ondonga and Oukwanyama. In 1884, the German Empire established rule over most of the territory, forming a colony known as German South West Africa. Between 1904 and 1908, German troops waged a punitive ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Free University Berlin
The Free University of Berlin (, often abbreviated as FU Berlin or simply FU) is a public research university in Berlin, Germany. It was founded in West Berlin in 1948 with American support during the early Cold War period as a Western continuation of the Friedrich Wilhelm University, or the University of Berlin, whose traditions and faculty members it retained. The Friedrich Wilhelm University (which was renamed the Humboldt University), being in East Berlin, was subject to East Germany's comparatively restrictive information laws. The ''Free University'' 's name referred to West Berlin's status as part of the intellectual continua of the Western " ''Free'' World", contrasting with communist-controlled East Berlin. In 2008, as part of a joint effort, the Free University of Berlin, along with the Hertie School of Governance, and WZB Social Science Research Center Berlin, created the Berlin Graduate School for Transnational Studies. The Free University of Berlin was conferr ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


South West Africa
South West Africa was a territory under Union of South Africa, South African administration from 1915 to 1990. Renamed ''Namibia'' by the United Nations in 1968, Independence of Namibia, it became independent under this name on 21 March 1990. South West Africa bordered People's Republic of Angola, Angola (Portuguese Angola, a Portuguese colony before 1975), Botswana (Bechuanaland Protectorate, Bechuanaland before 1966), South Africa, and Zambia (Northern Rhodesia before 1964). During its administration, South Africa applied its own apartheid system in the territory of South West Africa. A German colonial empire, German colony known as German South West Africa from 1884 to 1915, it was made a League of Nations mandate of the Union of South Africa following German Empire, Germany's defeat in the World War I, First World War. Although the mandate was repealed by the United Nations on 27 October 1966, South African control over the territory continued. The territory was administ ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Hardap Dam
The Hardap Dam is a dam close to Mariental in the Hardap Region of central Namibia. Built in 1963 while Namibia was under South African occupation, the Hardap Dam has been the largest dam in the country for more than five decades. After its completion in 2018, the Neckertal Dam near Keetmanshoop has at least 3 times the capacity of the Hardap Dam. The Hardap reservoir dams the Fish River and is home to numerous examples of wildlife of Namibia. Description First envisaged in 1897, Hardap Dam has a capacity of and a surface area of . Construction began in 1960 and was completed in 1963. The Hardap Dam supplies Mariental and the surrounding settlements with potable water. Its location close to the city, however, also poses a danger of flooding when sluices have to be opened fully due to good rains in the Fish River's catchment area. Reed grasses growing in the riverbed of the Fish River, slow down the flow of water and further aggravate the danger of flooding. (Full information ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Nama People
Nama (in older sources also called Namaqua) are an African ethnic group of South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. They traditionally speak the Khoekhoe language, Nama language of the Khoe languages, Khoe-Kwadi language family, although many Nama also speak Afrikaans. The Nama People (or Nama-Khoe people) are the largest group of the Khoekhoe people, many of whom have disappeared as a group. Many of the Nama clans live in Central Namibia and the other smaller groups live in Namaqualand, which today straddles the Namibian border with South Africa. History The Khoisan peoples of South Africa and southern Namibia maintained a nomadic life since time immemorial. The Khoekhoe were pastoralists and the San people lived as hunter-gatherers. The Nama are a Khoekhoe group. They originally inhabited the Orange River in southern Namibia and northern South Africa. The early colonialists referred to them as ''Hottentots''. Their alternative historical name, "Namaqua", stems from the addition o ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Damara People
The Damara, plural Damaran (Khoekhoegowab: ǂNūkhoen, ''Black people'', , referring to their extended stay in hilly and mountainous sites, also called at various times the Daman or the Damaqua) are an ethnic group who make up 8.5% of Namibia, Namibia's population. They speak the Khoekhoe language (like the Nama people) and the majority live in the northwestern regions of Namibia, however, they are also found widely across the rest of the country. Genetic studies have found that Damara are closely related to neighbouring Himba people, Himba and Herero people, Herero people, consistent with an origin from Bantu speakers who shifted to a different language and culture. Their name in their own language is the ''"Daman"'' (where the ''"-n"'' is just the Khoekhoe plural ending). The name ''"Damaqua"'' stems from the addition of the Khoekhoe suffix ''"-qua/khwa"'' meaning "people" (found in the names of other Southern African peoples like the Nama people, Nama and the Griqua people ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Oorlam Nama
The Oorlam or Orlam people (also known as Orlaam, Oorlammers, Oerlams, or Orlamse Hottentots) are a subtribe of the Nama people, largely assimilated after their migration from the Cape Colony (today, part of South Africa) to Namaqualand and Damaraland (now in Namibia). Oorlam clans were originally formed from mixed-race descendants of indigenous Khoikhoi, Europeans and slaves from Mozambique, Madagascar, India and Indonesia. Similar to the other Afrikaans-speaking group at the time, the Trekboers, Oorlam originally populated the frontiers of the infant Cape Colony, later living as semi-nomadic commandos of mounted gunmen. Also, like the Boers, they migrated inland from the Cape, and established several states in what are now South Africa and Namibia. The Oorlam migration in South Africa also produced the related Griqua people. History Beginning in the late 18th century, Oorlam communities migrated from the Cape Colony north to Namaqualand. They settled places earlier occupie ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Basters
The Basters (also known as Baasters, Rehobothers, or Rehoboth Basters) are a Southern African ethnic group descended from Cape Coloureds and Nama of Khoisan origin. Since the second half of the 19th century, the Rehoboth Baster community has been concentrated in central Namibia, in and around the town of Rehoboth. Basters are closely related to Afrikaners, Cape Coloureds, and Griquas of South Africa and Namibia, with whom they share a largely Afrikaner-influenced culture and Afrikaans language. Other groups of similar mixed ethnic origin, living chiefly in the Northern Cape, also refer to themselves as Basters. The name ''Baster'' is derived from "bastaard", the Dutch word for " bastard" or "mongrel". While some people consider this term demeaning, the Basters reappropriated it as an ethnonym, in spite of the negative connotation. Their 7th Kaptein is Jacky Britz, elected in 2021; he has no official status under the Namibian constitution. The Chief's Council of Rehoboth wa ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Ocean; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini; and it encloses Lesotho. Covering an area of , the country has Demographics of South Africa, a population of over 64 million people. Pretoria is the administrative capital, while Cape Town, as the seat of Parliament of South Africa, Parliament, is the legislative capital, and Bloemfontein is regarded as the judicial capital. The largest, most populous city is Johannesburg, followed by Cape Town and Durban. Cradle of Humankind, Archaeological findings suggest that various hominid species existed in South Africa about 2.5 million years ago, and modern humans inhabited the ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Boers
Boers ( ; ; ) are the descendants of the proto Afrikaans-speaking Free Burghers of the eastern Cape frontier in Southern Africa during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. From 1652 to 1795, the Dutch East India Company controlled the Dutch Cape Colony, which the United Kingdom incorporated into the British Empire in 1806. The name of the group is derived from Trekboer then later "boer", which means "farmer" in Dutch and Afrikaans. In addition, the term also applied to those who left the Cape Colony during the 19th century to colonise the Orange Free State, and the Transvaal (together known as the Boer Republics), and to a lesser extent Natal. They emigrated from the Cape to live beyond the reach of the British colonial administration, with their reasons for doing so primarily being the new Anglophone common law system being introduced into the Cape and the British abolition of slavery in 1833. The term ''Afrikaners'' or ''Afrikaans people'' is generally used in moder ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




The Forgotten Bride
"The Forgotten Bride" or "The Forgotten Fiancée" is a motif of folktales recognized in several folktale motif indices. It was first recognized by . It is a motif of endings of some tales, which can comprise several motifs.Christine Goldberg, 1992. It may be found, e.g., in Stith Thompson's Motif-Index of Folk-Literature as "D2003. Forgotten fiancée. Young husband visiting his home breaks tabu and forgets his wife. Later she succeeds in reawakening his memory". Sith Thompson classified it as 313C, adding it as a subtype of Antti Aarne 313: "The Magic Flight", most commonly a follow-up of the motif 313A "The Girl as Helper in the Hero's Flight". Overview According to Stith Thompson, after escaping from the villain's lair in a Magic Flight, the hero's female helper warns him against doing a certain action at home (e.g., being kissed by his mother or licked by his dog), lest he forgets his adventures. Despite her warning, the hero practices the taboo and forgets about her, e ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Fabula (journal)
''Fabula'' (from lat. ''fabula'': "story, fable") is a multilingual academic journal on comparative folklore studies with a focus on European narratives (such as fairy tales, sagas, and fables). It publishes essays, reviews, and conference reports in German, English, and French. Its subtitle is: ''Zeitschrift für Erzählforschung. Journal of Folktale Studies. Revue d'Etudes sur le Conte Populaire''. Since 1958, the journal has been published bi-annually by De Gruyter and is available in both print and online-editions. It was established by the German scholar Kurt Ranke and is currently edited by Brigitte Bönisch-Brednich, Simone Stiefbold, and Harm-Peer Zimmermann. It is closely connected to the multi-volume work ''Enzyklopädie des Märchens'' (''Encyclopedia of Fairy Tales'') and is an official journal of the International Society for Folk Narrative Research. From 1959 till 1970 the ''Supplement-Serie A, Texte'' was published. Abstracting and indexing The journal is abstract ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]