Centring Simon Kooper: Frontier Politics, Desert Environments and African Resistance

This article centres on |Gomxab Simon Kooper’s resistance to German colonialism in Southwest Africa (1884–1915, modern-day Namibia). First, it underscores the agency of Kooper and the Fransman Nama within southern African history. Kooper’s actions and motives fuelled widespread anxieties, shaped international correspondences and incurred mounting costs for the mainly German administration. Secondly, this analysis sheds further light on a complex international frontier space; Kooper found himself on the edges of three distinct political entities – German Southwest Africa, the Cape Colony and the British Bechuanaland Protectorate. Finally, the article argues that taking the environment of this borderland into account is essential for an understanding of these conflicts. Within the Kalahari Desert, access to water was critical not only to Kooper’s livelihood, but also to the success of German expeditions, and those of the Cape Colony and the Bechuanaland Protectorate. Their reliance on a melon-like fruit growing in parts of this arid landscape, as well as the animals adapted to desert spaces, highlights the importance of natural factors for discussions of historical events. African resistance ultimately emerged within a specific political and environmental context, shaping colonial dynamics beyond current historiographical understandings.