Elsie Vaalbooi of Rietfontein in the Northern Cape

Northern Cape

The Northern Cape is the largest and most sparsely populated province of South Africa. It was created in 1994 when the Cape Province was split up. Its capital is Kimberley. It includes the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park, part of an international park shared with Botswana...

 was a South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n woman who was a member of the ǂKhomani (Nǁnǂe) San or Bushmen

Bushmen

The indigenous people of Southern Africa, whose territory spans most areas of South Africa, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Mozambique, Swaziland, Botswana, Namibia, and Angola, are variously referred to as Bushmen, San, Sho, Barwa, Kung, or Khwe...

 and one of the last speakers of the Nǁng language. In the 1990s there was concern amongst the ǂKhomani leadership about loss of the Nǁng language: many of those of the community who could speak a KhoeSan language actually spoke Nama. Linguist Anthony Traill

Anthony Traill (linguist)

Professor Anthony Traill was a linguist , who was the world's foremost authority on a San language called !Xóõ. He published widely on this language, including a dictionary of the language...

 interviewed Vaalbooi in 1997, when she was in her late nineties. The South African San Institute became involved in the pursuit of information on the language and, with the help of Vaalbooi, they were able to trace a further ten people who could speak the language.

Northern Cape Motto

In 1997 Elsie Vaalbooi assisted linguists and provincial officials in providing a motto for the Northern Cape Province, Sa ||a !aĩsi 'uĩsi (“We go to a better life”), which is in the Nǀu dialect of the Nǁnǂe (ǂKhomani) people.

Vaalbooi has since died.