San people

The San people (or Saan), also known as Bushmen or Basarwa, are members of various indigenous hunter-gatherer people of Southern Africa, whose territories span Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa. There is a significant linguistic difference between the northern people living between the Okavango River in Botswana and Etosha National Park in northwestern Namibia, extending up into southern Angola; the central people of most of Namibia and Botswana, extending into Zambia and Zimbabwe; and the southern people in the central Kalahari towards the Molopo River, who are the last remnant of the previously extensive indigenous San of South Africa.

From the 1950s through the 1990s, the San switched to farming because of government-mandated modernisation programs. Despite the lifestyle changes, they have provided a wealth of information in anthropology and genetics. One broad study of African genetic diversity completed in 2009 found that the San were among the five populations with the highest measured levels of genetic diversity among the 121 distinct African populations sampled. The San are one of 14 known extant "ancestral population clusters," that is, "groups of populations with common genetic ancestry, who share ethnicity and similarities in both their culture and the properties of their languages."

South Africa

South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa, is the southernmost sovereign state in Africa. It is bounded on the south by 2,798 kilometers of coastline of southern Africa stretching along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans, on the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe, and on the east by Mozambique and Swaziland, and surrounding the kingdom of Lesotho. South Africa is the 25th-largest country in the world by land area, and with close to 53 million people, is the world's 24th-most populous nation. It is the southernmost country on the mainland of the Old World or the Eastern Hemisphere.

South Africa is a multiethnic society encompassing a wide variety of cultures, languages, and religions. Its pluralistic makeup is reflected in the constitution's recognition of 11 official languages, which is among the highest number of any country in the world. Two of these languages are of European origin: Afrikaans developed from Dutch and serves as the first language of most white and coloured South Africans; English reflects the legacy of British colonialism, and is commonly used in public and commercial life, though it is fourth-ranked as a spoken first language.

Sydney Adventist Hospital

Sydney Adventist Hospital, commonly known as the San, is a large private hospital in Sydney, Australia, located on Fox Valley Road in Wahroonga. Established on 1 January 1903, as a not-for-profit organisation, it was originally named the Sydney Sanitarium from which its colloquial name was derived. The hospital is operated by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, whose Australian headquarters are located in the immediate vicinity of the San. The hospital offers a broad range of acute medical, surgical, diagnostic, outpatient, support and wellness services, including Executive Health Checks at the Fox Valley Medical & Dental Centre.

As a not-for-profit health care facility, 2,200 staff and 700 accredited medical officers provide services for more than 50,000 inpatients and over 160,000 outpatients annually at the San.

The hospital is the base for the nursing course offered by Avondale College.

History

Sydney Sanitarium opened in Wahroonga on 1 January 1903 with a bed capacity of 70 and was known as a ‘home of health’ and as a place where people learned to stay well. The original Hospital building was designed by Dr Merritt Kellogg, brother of Dr John Harvey Kellogg. The Sanitarium became widely known as the ‘San’, and today, many years after its 1973 official name change to Sydney Adventist Hospital, it is still fondly referred to as ‘the San’ Hospital.

People

A people is a plurality of persons considered as a whole, as is the case with an ethnic group or nation. Collectively, for example, the contemporary Frisians and Danes are two related Germanic peoples, while various Middle Eastern ethnic groups are often linguistically categorized as the Semitic people. See the list of contemporary ethnic groups for more examples.

In politics

Various republics govern, or claim to govern, in the name of the people. Both the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire used the Latin term Senatus Populusque Romanus, (the Senate and People of Rome). This term was fixed to Roman legionary standards, and even after the Roman Emperors achieved a state of total personal autarchy, they continued to wield their power in the name of the Senate and People of Rome.

A People's Republic is typically a Marxist or socialist one-party state that claims to govern on behalf of the people. Populism is another umbrella term for various political tendencies that claim to represent the people, usually with an implication that they serve the common people instead of the elite.

Kalahari Desert

The Kalahari Desert (in Afrikaans: Kalahari-woestyn) is a large semi-arid sandy savannah in southern Africa extending 900,000 square kilometres (350,000 sq mi), covering much of Botswana, parts of Namibia (previously South West Africa), and South Africa. A semi-desert, with huge tracts of excellent grazing after good rains, the Kalahari supports more animals and plants than a true desert, such as the Namib Desert to the west. There are small amounts of rainfall and the summer temperature is very high. The driest areas usually receive 110–200 millimetres (4.3–7.9 in) of rain per year, and the wettest just a little over 500 millimetres (20 in). The surrounding Kalahari Basin covers over 2,500,000 square kilometres (970,000 sq mi) extending farther into Botswana, Namibia and South Africa, and encroaching into parts of Angola, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The Kalahari is home to many migratory birds and animals. Previously havens for wild animals from elephants to giraffes, and for predators such as lions and cheetahs, the riverbeds are now mostly grazing spots, though leopards and cheetahs can still be found. The area is now heavily grazed and cattle fences restrict the movement of wildlife. Among deserts of the Southern Hemisphere, the Kalahari most closely resembles some Australian deserts in its latitude and its mode of formation. The Kalahari Desert came into existence approximately sixty million years ago along with the formation of the African continent.