| Oromo women live as traders, wood carriers, shepherds, and farmers in and around the ancient trade center of Harar in Hararghe Province, Ethiopia. They have lived with the uncertainties of drought, famine, war, and political unrest for several generations and experienced poverty, disease, and severe restrictions in personal freedom. These same women, both young and old, adorn themselves with an array of body modifications and supplements. This study seeks to understand why these women decorate their bodies in particular ways and why they invest so much time and effort in doing so. These questions will be addressed first by tracing the historical development of dress from the mid-nineteenth century to the present, then through an investigation of the changes brought about in the Oromo social system during this period, and finally by a closer examination of the objects activated on the body in particular contexts. This narrative of dress will uncover further ideas about the decorated body as an aesthetic and symbolic system as it relates to the construction of history, identity, and aesthetics.;In order to locate the form, function, and meaning of dress and the decorated body in history and cultural practice, this thesis is divided into two parts. The first half examines the history in which formal and symbolic choices have been made in coiffure, jewelry, clothing, and skin markings. In particular, this section explores Oromo dress in relation to trade, the introduction to Islam, the disintegration of traditional Oromo institutions, and the political changes brought about by the incorporation of Harar into the Ethiopian Empire.;The second half of this dissertation focuses on the use of dress and the decorated body as a means of examining Oromo social discourse. Here the body serves as a framing device to further explore the socially marked stages that occur in a woman's life as she moves from childhood through old age.;In both the broad, historical overview and the more specific, body-centered investigation of dress, several diametrically opposed tensions resurface in the meanings of various body art practices. These include concealing versus revealing, repelling versus attracting, beautifying versus disfiguring, and tying versus cutting. It is my intention that these ideas function as conceptual threads that bind the two analytical approaches in writing together. |
