Throughout this semester we have learned many rituals of the African culture, particularly the importance of initiations. These initiations signify the transition from childhood to adulthood. Bamana male initiation and women’s initiation among the Mende people are two specific groups that highly recognize this transitional period with great importance. The training is rigorous and involves lots of lessons to build character.
Among the Bamana people, the importance of initiation from childhood to adulthood is seen in various ways. Part of their vernacular used by the Bamana people of Mali was a word called Jow. Men may be initiated into religious associations according to their age and capacity of knowledge. Initiates move through the different
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It consists of one initiation instead of multiple. Although, the initiation of these young ladies incorporates many symbolic masks, figures, clothing, and rituals. The women society that Mende females become initiated into, when of age, is known as Bondo or Sande society. The initiation of these young girl’s spans over a long period of time for they are taken away from the community and spend their time in the bush. This is also very similar to the Bamana male initiation process. To the Mende people, the bush is where the girls learn what it means to be an honorable woman in their community, and it is often where they undergo a female circumcision, known as a “clitoridectomy”. The bush school is like the initiation camp that creates a sister-like bond between the girls. The initiates do everything together and after this is all done and they are initiated they may look to each other for all sorts of things in life. For the duration of this time, these young girls are off limits in the eyes of men. Their hair is wrapped in a head wrap and their body is covered in white clay to symbolize which woman are undergoing initiation and must not interact with the males in the community. The Sande society holds a “ndaniti” ceremony where carved wooden headdresses, known as “Ndoli jowei”. These masks are worn in Sande ceremonial dances. They characterize the women’s sexuality, complex hair, and health (the neck rolls). The spirit that manifests in the mask guides the performers as the spirits mystical powers work through them. It is important that during the performance the young girls are covered from head toe. If any of their body is exposed during the initiation ceremony, then the spirit may enter her body. After the initiation, the newly initiated adult women of the community dress in modern dresses with modern hairstyles and must sit quietly to reflect on who they are now
Selection of Book: There were numerous purposes and objectives as to why I chose to read this particular anthropology manuscript of all the various other options available. For one, I selected this book initially due to the title of the book. “Dancing Skeleton” was the portion of the title that primarily stuck out to me, and made me imagine African children – who we see on commercials all the time in third world countries, which tend to look malnourished all throughout their adolescents – dancing around with skin-wrapped skeletal bones. Personally, for me, seeing children suffering from malnourishment and starvation must be one of the most unbearably agonizing pains a child can go through, not to mention the suffering of a mother having to watching her child gradually starve to death. I was additionally very much interested in understanding precisely what other individuals in different parts of the world and specifically Mali, are lacking that is affecting their health and well-being so noticeably. Furthermore, I was especially interested is reading informal stories and accounts through the eyes of the author about conducting specified field research on infant feeding and the importance of children
"For the most part, headdresses are restricted items. In particular, the headdress worn by most non-natives imitate those worn by various Plains nations. These headdresses are further restricted within the cultures to men who have done certain things to earn them. It is very rare for women in Plains cultures to wear these headdresses, and their ability to do so is again quite restricted."
This world and the world of spirits are transformations of each other. At death a cotton mask - a "white cloud mask" - is placed on the face of a dead person. The spirits of the dead return to this world as kachinas. All kachinas are believed to take on cloud form of what Pueblo call "to be cloud people" and their spiritual essence, or navala, is a liquid that is manifested as rainfall. When the kachinas (as ritual figures) depart, they are petitioned, "When you return to your homes bring this message to them that, without delay, they may have mercy for us with their liquid essence [rain] so that all things may grow and life may be bountiful." Everything, in Pueblo belief, is dependent on rainfall, which, when combined with Mother Earth, is the essence of all things. Hence navala is also the essence of the individual self, conceived of as a liquid, and a Pueblo will say, "I have the liquid essence of my fathers," to express the English notion of being of the same flesh and blood.
This paper elaborates on the diverse contributions peoples of African descent have made to the pluralistic religious landscape of America and replicates various passages from our textbook. It focuses on the personal narratives of non-religious to religious leaders—exemplifying their influence on the African American religious movement during slavery and the reconstruction of America. Each section represents different historical periods, regional variations, and non-Christian expressions of African-American religion.
Being a resident of South Carolina, African-American Culture was chosen as part of the applied learning project for the Intercultural Nursing class, because African-Americans make up more than a quarter of this state’s population. According to the 2010 United States Census Bureau, the total population for South Carolina (S.C.) is 4,625,364, with 27.9% being of African-American descent. The purpose of this paper is to develop an understanding and sensitivity to issues and cultural variances or phenomena that are unique to the African-American Culture. Another goal is to identify nursing interventions that are important for the nurse to consider in caring for this population. These phenomena’s include variances in social organization, communication, space, perception of time, environmental control, and biological variations associated with the African-American culture. (Giger, 2013 and South Carolina minority, n.d.)
Considering descendants’ effort to bring this culture back in society, this entire dancing performance, masks, and the idea of interacting with the outside world must not have been merely correlated to their religious and spiritual ritual. It might have been their identity; a symbolic of their society which their ancestors had built and passed down to them.
This is almost a tribal ritual making a mask. The boys use masks to cover their identity and this allows them to kill.
It is the celebration of life that is done symbolically using a chalice and Athame. It is part of the Beltane rituals. Symbolic version creation in the union of the maiden Goddess with her loving God. Beltane is a celebration of sexuality, purification and fertility. The planting of crops is finished, and many crops have grown to seedlings. Bees are very active pollinating flowers, and many creatures are in the height of their mating season. I would not use this in my practice this is not something that is something I want to do. I would light the fires and have the joy of the rituals without taking off my clothes I do not plan on joining a coven and they do not all use it as a sexual thing anyway. It is misunderstood by many people in many ways it is not just a sexual ritual between a man and an women it is also between the chalice and the athame. On the eve of Beltane all fires were extinguished and relit with embers from the Beltane fire. The fires celebrated the return of life and fruitfulness to the earth and would protect, heal and purify anything or one that passed by or jumped over. That it is an actual sexual act performed by the Priest and Priestess of a coven after a ritual. But this is not the case in all ritual in most cases it is between a chalice and a athame. You have to have a sexual doing in these rituals and in fact, it is only in some covens that do this and hardly done anymore.
Many African cultures see life as a cycle we are born, we grow and mature, enter adulthood, and one day we will eventually die but the cycle continues long after death. In Africa art is used as a way to express many things in their society, in this paper I will focus on different ways traditional African art are used to describe the cycle of one’s life. Since Africa is such a large continent it is important to keep in mind that every country and tribe has different rituals and views when it comes to the cycle of life. It is estimated to be well over a thousand different ethnic groups and cultures in Africa today. Thousands of cultures in Africa see the stages of life bound together in a continuous cycle; a cycle of birth, growth, maturity,
The Ghost Dance; Ethnohistory and Revitalization. Chicago: Holt, Rinehart and Winston Inc, 1989. Lawrence, Elizabeth Atwood. “Sun Dance.”
African Americans practice a various number of religions, Christianity is by far the most popular. Up to the present day religiosity has always been a coping behavior among African Americans. The majority of them found peace and hope in their spirituals during slavery. Throughout one of the most dark times in our nations history, religion has played a big roll for African Americans. They created ways of expressing African meanings and values through the form of songs and stories. Due to their enslavement they established and passed down their own practices, religious services, and religious socialization.
Slavery. Many people today would like to forget that part of America 's past but, for African Americans, it is not so easily forgotten. For African Americans, life in America has been tumultuous to say the least. Since those first few horrendous centuries, African Americans have been making strides towards a better existence. Things are better now because of the countless African Americans who strived and believed that things could be better for their people. Even though African Americans still have a ways to go, African Americans have come a long way over the course of 100 years because the foundation of the NAACP, the Harlem Renaissance, the "I Have A Dream" speech, and the fact that an
In this paper I discuss the praise prayers excerpt of Afua Kuma, an African, within the view that beliefs emerge and are “enfolded within practices, things and feelings that shape individuals and communities over time” (Morgan 2012: xiv). Expounding on this statement, Idowu in his book about African Traditional Religion makes a point that a person knows as much he or she is exposed to and as much as is given to him to know, and he or she expresses his or her beliefs accordingly. These beliefs are revealed through their everyday actions, emotions and thought processes and consequently, influence the person and the all-inclusive community. Specifically, I discuss Afua Kuma’s belief in the Supreme Being, her understanding of the concept of Jesus Christ as a Chief and the practice of animism that she employs in her act of worship to Jesus Christ.
Traditions are practices/beliefs that are passed down from generation to generation. In traditional African societies, a kinship ties people through birth or marriage. There are two kinds of relationships in customary African tradition; those bound by blood, which are called consanguine, and those constructed by marriage, called affilial. There are four key descents that determine inheritance and marriage. However, the most common descent is patrilineal, which traces ancestry through one's father. While in America, we are vary tolerant of tracing our descent from both parents.
Young girls of distinctive ethnicities, societies and religions have diverse inhibitions, with regards to wears. For instance, honing Muslim ladies