Getting to know hunting here in Karankasso also meant developing a different sensibility toward animal death, learning to cut their throat, burn their skin, take out intestines and cut them into pieces for women to prepare. In the case of bigger animals, there is really a lot of blood coming out and sounds and smells…

This is, so far, perhaps the post with the longest preparation I put together. I started gathering material in October 2011, and now can say I have more or less assembled all the materials I needed. Its focus is the characteristic uniform of the donsow, a powerful means of identification recognised by both initiated members and…

I decided to drop the shotgun for a day and keep the camera in hand, going hunting with Lasso and Go-Seydou. The day was very very hot, small animals can be caught resting in the shadows. But the bush is starting to become green with new leaves, which makes following game increasingly difficult. The experience…

When asking about the tèen and the saansègè I was told there is a figure that is in charge of performing a sacrifice that asks permission to start the collective hunts and the fishing. Today I met a man about 55, called Sa-Sibiri Traoré. In Seenku he is called Juunsira (Juun=Bush, Sira=Master), in Jula Kungotigi (same meaning). There…

Today I went with a friend to visit his mother’s village near Bobo Dioulasso. It is a Bobo village on the road to Diebougou, and we visited in the period of the funerals. Much unlike the Sambla, the Bobo have many masks that come out for different rituals. Some of these have the peculiarity of…

After the annual dankun sacrifice of Brahima Traoré in Samogohiri, masks come from the bush to roam in the village. They are animals, a buffalo, a black monkey, some dagwé (Roan Antelope, Hippotragus Equinus), and an old man. They are each accompanied by a warden, who has the task to “control” and communicate with them….