Women pounding millet, Sanga region, Mali

"Dogon women spend countless hours pounding millet, hefting their heavy wooden poles with dexterity. They remove the hulls and later crunch the kernels of grain in another bout of pounding. girls learn at an early age, practicing in small mortars." [Hollyman S. and Van Beek W., 2001: Dogon, Africa's People of the Cliffs. Harry N Abrams, Inc.]. During his trip to Mali, Elisofon visited the Dogon people in Sanga (Sangha), a group of thirteen villages lying east of Bandiagara at the top of an escarpment. This photograph was taken when Eliot Elisofon was on assignment for National Geographic and traveled to Africa from January 19, 1972 to mid April 1972.