Beads, cotton, iron, cowrie shellexpand_more
The Mary Ruth Weisel Endowment for Africa, Oceania, and the Americasexpand_more 2010.3.1
Dinka men used to dress lightly—until recently, they simply covered their torsos in tight, beaded corsets, highlighting their lithe figures. But these garments did more than that: the colors of the beads signal social and marital status as well as the wearer’s age. Red and black means a young man between 15 and 25 years old.
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