Bad Ethnography

We assume nothing and mean no harm.

[bobbole]

Mohammed Abed, Palestinian girl flying her kite on Al-Waha Beach - Gaza, Palestine, 2011

[mioritic]

"A hajfonat koszorúba tevése" ("Putting the braid into a wreath").

Károly Kós, Judit Szentimrei, and Jenő Nagy (eds.), Szilágysági magyar népművészet. Öltözet (Bucharest: Kriterion, 1974)

[folklorespring]

Embroideresses from Chernihiv, Ukraine, 1914

[folklorespring]

An Orthodox Christian family in the Jaramana district of southern Damascus enjoying their Easter lunch in 2008. Ed Kashi.

[smsomah]

India, 1937-38. Egon von Eickstedt

[smsomah]

Scanned from the book Desert Eves: An Indian Paradise; Catherine Clement and photos by Hans Silvester; 2001

[henk-heijmans]

Niang Soli, a maestro of the Legong dance, still performing at 108 years old, Bali, Indonesia - by Giovanna Aryafara, Australian

[fragrantblossoms]

Eduard Gübelin. Ethiopia, Harar, young basket weaver, 1960-1970.

[smsomah]

Scanned from the book Desert Eves: An Indian Paradise; Catherine Clement and photos by Hans Silvester; 2001

[tinyuglyworld]

Malagasy girl, Madagascar

[anyahita]

Iran, 1970s

[hellwatermelon]

Irving Penn, Three Rissani Women with Bread, 1971

[smsomah]

Yemen, 1980-2001. Scanned from the book Bedouin and Nomads: Peoples of the Arabian Desert; Etienne Dehau; 2007

[smsomah]

Tunisia. Photo by Walter Dombrowsky. From the book Nordafrika: Marokko, Algerien, Tunesien, Libyen; Hedwig Wimmer, 1956

[padurenii]

Soviet Era Murals in Kazakhstan and Tashkent, Uzbekistan

[yearningforunity]

In French Guiana, until the abolition of slavery, Carnival was exclusively reserved for colonists and was celebrated in the form of costume parties they organized in their homes. But since Carnival is, and always has been, a transgressive interlude before Lent, the enslaved organized clandestine celebrations. It was a way to regain a little freedom by mocking the colonists, covering themselves in molasses or flour.

In the mid-19th century, when slavery was abolished in French Guiana, the territory had 13,000 slaves out of a population of 19,000. It was these freed slaves who gave the Guianese carnival its unique character. They reimagined it in their own image, incorporating their own history and African heritage. 

Throughout history, the carnival has become more diverse, to reflect today all the ethnic diversity of French Guiana.

[blondebrainpowered]

The Owls Club was a black women’s softball team formed the late 1930s in Seattle. The Owls won the first women’s Washington State Softball Championship in 1938. The team, renamed the Brown Bombers, won the championship again in 1939.