Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21863

Photographs by Rebecca Busselle and Sylvia Ardyn Boone

The Sande Society of the Mende is a widespread secret female regulatory society that both guards and transmits the ideals of feminine beauty that comprise the fundamental aesthetic criterion in Mende culture. The Sande initiation camp is conceived as a realm beneath the waters, a domain from which beauty and art emerge, a sacred space where women rule. In this eloquent and moving book, Sylvia Ardyn Boone describes the society, its organization, some of its rituals, and finally the mask worn by its members—an archetypal African sculpture called the Sande Sowo head. Her observations are not only an evocative account of Mende life and philosophy but are also a unique approach to the study of African art, an approach based on African conceptions about the human body and the person. Boone's engaging text is accompanied by extraordinary photographs of Mende women by Rebecca Busselle.

After introducing the reader to Mende history and ethnography, Boone discusses the Sande Society as a program for promoting the spiritual and physical beauty of Mende women. She then shows that an examination of the physical qualities and proportions of feminine beauty is a portal to an understanding of Mende ideas of morality and power. Under the tutelage of Mende elders Boone learned, for example, that the sight of a luxuriant head of hair arranged in an intricate style gives pleasure, but that is also encodes at higher levels notions of right behavior, successful social relations, progeny, and abundance. Equipped with this intimate knowledge, Boone is able to analyze in new ways the symbolism of the Sande Sowo head, and uncovers the meaning of this sculpture by viewing it against the background of the Mende natural and metaphysical world from which it emerges and to which it refers.

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Author

PublisherYale University Press

Print publication date August 1986 (out of print)

Print ISBN 9780300035766

EISBN 9780300266016

Illustrations 92

Print Status out of print

Publisher (out of print)

WorldCat

Google Books

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List of illustrations

Mende script
Map of Mendeland (Southern and Eastern Provinces in Sierra Leone)
Mende Sowo mask in Sande ceremony
Two Mende Women (Sande)
Mende girls painted with hojo
Mende girl painted with hojo
Mende woman wearing fengbė
Mende women--Sowo and Ligba Wa
Ndoli Jowei
Klėi (Klawa)
Mende woman--Sowo
Mende women
Mende girl painted with hojo
Mende Sowo mask in Sande ceremony (view of kpanguima in the distance)
Smiling Mende women and girls (nya mbaa in kpanguima)
Mende woman wearing njabu patterned dress
Mende women
Food from a kpanguima
Mende women with herbal wreaths
Mende girls (nyaha)
Mende girl painted with hojo
Mende girl painted with hojo
Mende women and children
Mende girls singing
Mende woman cooking
Mende women singing
Mende girls performing
Mende women
Mende woman
Mende woman
Mende woman
Mende girls
Mende girl
Mende mother and child
Mende mother and child
Mende girl
Mende woman
Mende girls painted with hojo
Mende mother and child
Mende woman's hands at work
Mende woman at work
Mende woman and child
Sowo dancer in crowd
Mende girl smiling
Mende woman
Mende girls
Mende girl
Mende women
Mende women and girls (haenjo ceremony)
Mende women and girls (haenjo ceremony)
Mende woman smiling
Mende girl and child
Mende girl
Sowo mask
Sowo mask
Sowo mask
Sowo masks
Mende, Sowo Masks, Bundu Dancers, Kenema, Sierra Leone
Sowo mask
Sowo mask, detail of neck rings
Sowo mask, detail of ear
Sowo mask
Sowo mask, detail of forehead
Mende girl with headscarf
Mende woman
Sowo mask
Mende girl with braided hair
Mende woman with headscarf
Mende girls braiding hair
Sowo mask
Sowo mask
Mende girls painted with hojo and wearing crocheted caps
Mende dancer with Sowo mask
Sowo mask with snake and bird adornment
Sowo mask with snake adornment
Sowo mask with bird adornment
Sowo mask with bird adornment
Sowo mask with bird adornment
Sowo mask with crocodile adornment
Sowo mask with horn adornments
Mende woman with kettle
Mende girl with cowrie bead necklace
Sowo mask with amulet
Sowo mask with crests
Sowei mask with crown
Sowo mask
Sowo mask and costume
Sowo mask and costume
Sowo mask
Legs of Mende girls painted with hojo
Mende woman and Sowo mask
Sowo dancer's costume, detail of bells

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Contents

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

Contents

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21864

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Acknowledgments

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~This book is in honor and praise of Sowei, the wise women who are the leaders of the Sande Society. It is they who create the settings and situations in which Sande’s lofty concepts and ideals are translated into a human program for female advancement. I want to express my admiration to the Sowei, and to all Mende women my appreciation for...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21865

Prologue: Conducting Research into Mende Art

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~The Mende people of Sierra Leone say: Hani gbė lewe ma ngele ya nja gbili kaangȯ kpowa ėė tȯ—“There is a thing passing in the sky; some thick clouds surround it; the uninitiated...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.xi-xxii

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21866

Chapter subject tags:Mende (African people)Sierra LeoneFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)Fieldwork

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1. Mende History and Culture: A Brief Overview

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~The history of the West Atlantic coast of Africa, the entire “Upper Guinea Coast” area, is presently the subject of intense debate among historians, anthropologists, and ethnolinguists. In the past...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.1-12

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.001

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21867

Chapter subject tags:Mende (African people)Sierra Leone--HistoryWomen, MendeAtlantic Coast (Africa, West)Sande SocietyMende languageMende (African people)--Rites and ceremonies

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2. The Sande Society

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~The Sande Society is one of the most powerful patrons of the arts in West Africa. Over the years the society has commissioned thousands of pieces of sculpture for use in its educational and social projects. The documentary opportunities provided by a study of this society are extraordinary. Sande is most important for a study of women and art in contemporary...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.13-43

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.002

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21868

Chapter subject tags:Women, MendeSande SocietyMende (African people)--Rites and ceremoniesMasks, MendeFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)--Africa

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3. Kpanguima: The World of Beauty That Sande Makes

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~Kpanguima, the sacred Sande initiation grove, is a world apart. The Sande Society builds it as a special place where Sowei rules by Sande concepts and laws. Within the walls of the kpanguima, the women congregate for a Sande session; they separate themselves from the rest of the community and gather together in their own...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.45-79

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.003

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21869

Chapter subject tags:Women, MendeMende (African people)--Rites and ceremoniesSande SocietyFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)--Africa

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4. Physical and Metaphysical Aspects of Mende Feminine Beauty

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

Mende think that human beings comprise the most interesting category of things in the world...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.81-152

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.004

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21870

Chapter subject tags:Women, MendeMasks, MendeSande SocietyMende (African people)--Rites and ceremoniesFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)--Africa

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5. Sowo: The Good Made Visible

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~The Sande Society is a concept, an ideal, an organization, a body of knowledge, a collection of objects, a fellowship of women. The society is sacred, and its communion is secret. Sowo, the classical Sande Society mask, is the embodiment of the society, a presentation which Sande has designed to ennoble its members and strengthen the larger community. In Sowo the...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.153-244

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.005

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21871

Chapter subject tags:Women, MendeMasks, MendeSande SocietyMende (African people)--Rites and ceremoniesHairstyles--AfricaFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)--Africa

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Conclusions

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~In a lament at the sudden death of a young Mende woman, an older Sande nyaha cries: “Let us not hear this! My child, big forehead, woman with plenty of hair, what brought this for you? My Sande-girl!” Another intones, “Do not leave me, Ô big forehead, Ô my child, fine neck!” A woman relative, after listing the...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Related print edition pages: pp.245-248

https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00275.006

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21872

Chapter subject tags:Women, MendeFeminine beauty (Aesthetics)--AfricaSande SocietyMende (African people)--Rites and ceremonies

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Glossary

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

Glossary

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21873

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Selected Bibliography

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

Selected Bibliography

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21874

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Note on Illustrations

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

~Most of the photographs for Radiance from the Waters were taken on location in Sierra Leone by the talented photographer Rebecca Busselle. I was fortunate in having from her a marvelous choice of images that so well illustrate the ideas and concepts of this book; I feel that the aesthetic arguments made by the text are amply supported by her pictures. Specifically, the Busselle photographs are figures 3–8, 10–15, 17–30, 32–35,...

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21875

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Index

Radiance from the Waters: Ideals of Feminine Beauty in Mende Art

Index

Author

PublisherYale University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21876