Photo 2: Mwali - Initiation for Girls

Photo 2: Mwali: Initiate girl coming out.

Boys and girls, in what Vansina calls the Lunda cultural region (1966:22), go through initiation. In Zambia the Chokwe, Luchazi, Lunda, Luvale, Mbunda and Ndembu people belong to this cultural complex.

Mukanda is the initiation for boys, Mwali is the initiation for girls.

Initiate dancing at the coming out phase of Mwali. Lusaka, Kaunda Square stage II, 1985. Photo by author.

 The initiate during mwali is confined to a hut where she is taught what women, especially as wives, should know. The coming out ceremony is a festive affair, at least for the community, in which the initiate shows her dancing skills and is presented as a nubile woman.

 

After the dancing the girl is now presented to the community. Seated at her right is her attendant/guardian, seated at her left is her “husband,” at least for the occasion. 1985. Photo by author.

Mukanda and mwali are in many ways opposite ceremonies. The boys are initiated as a group, the girls individually. The boys are initiated in a secretly located camp outside the village in the bush; the girls remain in, or at the fringe of, the village. Generally the boys are considerably younger than the girls. In mwali the girls are prepared for marriage, which in the past would follow directly or soon after the initiation ritual. The boy initiates are much too young to take on adult roles.