She is beautiful. She is the ‘mother of liberation’. She is Green Tara. Tara is a Buddhist tantric meditation deity, and she takes many forms. One of the most widely known forms is the Green Tara, who is known as the Buddha of enlightened activity. […]
The Malagasy raffia cloth – A convergence of three historical trajectories
Guest blogger Anders Norge Lauridsen takes an unassuming raffia cloth from Madagascar as his point of departure, and tells a tale that spans 1600 years and half the globe. Join us as he shows us how objects can hold This elegant raffia cloth from Madagascar […]
In Other Shoes: Turkish Harem Shoes
Previously, ethnographica.net has showcased shoes from the wonderful shoe collection made by Søren L. Tuxen, zoologist and shoe enthusiast. You can read about him in our previous post here: https://ethnographica.net/2015/04/14/tuxen/ In his collection of almost 250 pairs are shoes and other footwear from all over […]
Necessity is the mother of invention: Bamboo school book
Homework. A concept disliked by youths all over the world. Probably also in the north-eastern part of Thailand, where this ‘school book’ is from. It was collected by the now former missionary, Peder Jørgensen, who has spent more than 25 years in Thailand. On a […]
Talking to the dead: The ’Bridge Phone’
Imagine being able to talk to your dead loved ones. No, this is not a rhetorical question; try to imagine actually being able to answer your mobile phone and talking to your dead husband, mother, wife, or child at the other end of the line. […]
A portable life: Bedouin cradle
Imagine not having a permanent home. Or, try to imagine being at home wherever you are. It can be quite a hard exercise for many of us, who live in our houses and apartments, surrounded by our stuff, travelling the same paths to work, to […]
Ceremonial cannon
Can we just talk about how awesome this cannon is? It is not that big – about 67 centimetres in length – but that is actually one of the great things about it. Because cannons are usually these gigantic beasts, but this one you can […]
A testament to children’s imagination: “Poo/toys”
The Ethnographic Collections at Moesgaard Museum contains many amazing and interesting things. We have a Peruvian mummy, beautiful swords, a rare Thai temple scroll, Gandao grave figures from Kalasha, Pakistan, ancestor figures from Papua New Guinea… the list is endless. However, we also have some […]
A strange protector: Stuffed lizard from Algeria
Who on earth is this little dude?!? With his stiff legs sticking out, he does not look too comfortable lying there, in our photographer’s studio, on his big, bloated belly, mouth wide open. In fact, he has travelled a long way to get here: all […]
Spring is here! Bird toy from Madagascar
It is that time of year again. Birds are singing in the morning, anemones and daffodils are shooting out of the ground, and the trees are covered in vivid green buds, just longing to burst. Spring is here! In Denmark, the winter is long, dark […]
Following the call: The Indian missionary collection
Imagine taking your family and travelling halfway around the world, to a place, which is strange and wholly different from everything you know. Now imagine that it is 1874 and that place is Madras in India. What do you bring from home, to remind you […]
A Museum Tale: Samurai Garbs
The readers will have to excuse the author for being even more of a nerd than usual. But in museum ethnography and some part of anthropology, the explanatory powers of objects are being explored these years. I just read a book a couple of weeks […]
