Like the Maasai men, Maasai women dutifully exercise several rights of passage. At the age of thirteen, Maasai girls are unceremoniously circumcised. This involves the removal of the clitoris and often the labia as well. A Muslim friend of mine who is not a Maasai, but who is a Fulani, survived a full circumcision as an adolescent girl in Mali. She stoically recounted to me, in detail, the day when her relative came to her hut and circumcised her. Her mother and sisters pinned her down and stuck a stick in her mouth so that she would not bite her tongue. She said that the knife was dull and that she screamed in agony as it seared her flesh. My friend stated to me that, however painful the experience was, she is glad she was circumcised because it is part of her Fulani womanly duty. Despite her claims of no remorse, my friend and her sisters campaigned successfully to their mother, sparing their baby sister from being thus transformed. My sister Alicia introduced me to this friend. They had obtained their doctorates together in educational policy studies. Our friend went on to become a professor of woman studies at a prestigious university in California. When I painted these faceless Maasai girls, I thought about the sexual mutilation so many African girls endure. |
