Herero households

We describe details of Herero residential units and discuss the meaning of household among Herero ranchers of northwestern Botswana and conclude that there is no single meaningful household. Rather there is a dual system of local social units. From the male perspective, a household is a hamlet with the associated herd and huts or hut clusters within it. From the female perspective, a household is a hut or hut cluster with dependent children that she maintains and manages. There have been dramatic social and economic changes in this century. Herero were destitute refugees from a genocidal war in 1904, while today they are one of the wealthiest groups in the region. They suffered from infertility before antibiotics became available around 1960, so that the TFR has changed from about 2.7 to 7.0 in the last three decades. We discuss the effects of these changes on local organization.