Kalashnikov Guardian - a photo on Flickriver

Returning the photographer's gaze - sometimes with a proud and knowing smile, an indignant look of resistance and mimicry, or a long studied stare as the observer becomes the observed. The gaze is returned, the observer othered. Subject owns the gaze for a frozen moment.

I was struck by the seeming incongruity of a young Hamar daughter in charge of an AK-47 semi-automatic assault rifle in her hamlet. It was explained through my Amharic and Hamar interpreters that a rifle and bullet-belt are commonly handed over by a husband to a wife or an older child for safe keeping inside the household and larger hamlet perimeter. Dara volunteered this spontaneous pose by a Hamar cattle kraal in the remote Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region of Ethiopia.

The value of a Kalashnikov can range from five to thirty-five cows and often figures into the bridewealth or payment made by the husband’s family to the bride's family. It symbolizes wealth, status and power. Above all, the Kalashnikov provides protection during cattle drives to water and grazing land, security in the sorghum gardens, and fire-power during armed conflicts with neighbouring tribes in southern Ethiopia's lower Omo Valley.

© All rights to these photos and descriptions are reserved. expl#188

Documentary Portraiture | Lonely Planet | Social Documentary

Taken in: Ethiopia / SNNPR / Hamer Bena (show map)

Taken on: January 12, 2024

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