An Apache girl's Sunrise Dance

After six hours of continuous dancing at a Sunrise Dance, an Apache girl's first menstruation rite, the girl rests in camp together with her helper and a cousin on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation in Arizona, USA. The girl is covered with sacred yellow pollen from the cattail plant, which has been applied as a blessing by the medicine man and the relatives. The Sunrise Dance is an enactment of the Apache creation myth and during the rites the girl ’becomes‘ Changing Woman, a mythical female figure, and comes into possession of her healing powers. The rites are also supposed to prepare the girl for adulthood and to give her a long and healthy life without material wants.

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Copyright: Copyright © 2004 Anders Ryman. All rights reserved.
Image Size: 5112x3376 / 11.2MB; America American Indian American Indians American Southwest Apache Arizona Changing Woman Girls Horizontal Native Americans Native North Americans North America Outdoors Religion Rite of Passage San Carlos Indian Reservation Sitting Sunrise Dance US USA United States of America abalone shell adulthood animal hide buck-skin buckskin camp dress cane cattail ceremony eagle feathers ethnic ethnic group ethnic minority eye contact first menstruation fringed fringes indigenous people life cycle ceremony longevity maturity minority native-americans ornament outside pollen puberty rite religious teenage girl three persons only water
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After six hours of continuous dancing at a Sunrise Dance, an Apache girl's first menstruation rite, the girl rests in camp together with her helper and a cousin on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation in Arizona, USA. The girl is covered with sacred yellow pollen from the cattail plant, which has been applied as a blessing by the medicine man and the relatives. The Sunrise Dance is an enactment of the Apache creation myth and during the rites the girl ’becomes‘ Changing Woman, a mythical female figure, and comes into possession of her healing powers. The rites are also supposed to prepare the girl for adulthood and to give her a long and healthy life without material wants.