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Baga Masks: Nimba, the Massive Mother of Fertility on the Guinea Coast
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Most masks in this book are worn the way you would expect a mask to be worn, over the face, or as a helmet enclosing the head. The Baga, roughly 60,000 people on the…
Salampasu Masks: Copper Faces of a Warrior Society in the Congo
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Some African masks were inherited with a family name. A Salampasu mask was not one of them. To wear one, a man had to do something first: perform a specific deed, pay in livestock…
Kakuunga and Kholuka: The Masks of Yaka Initiation in the Congo
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → Yaka or yakala means “males,” “the strong ones.” Bayaka, the name the roughly 300,000 Yaka people of the southwestern Democratic Republic of the Congo call themselves, means “the strong people.” It is not a…
Ekuk and Gon Masks of the Kwele: The Beete Ritual Against Witchcraft
New: the 2nd edition of Within Carved Lines: The Secret Meanings of African Masks is out now. Get the book → The Kwele mask is easy to recognize and hard to forget. A pale, heart shaped face. A triangular nose. Eyes closed or nearly closed, like someone deep in thought rather than deep in performance….