all photos by the author except where otherwise noted
The Cross River, which begins in the Cameroon mountains and rolls west and then south toward the Nigerian coast, has provided a fertile climate for ritual systems and masquerades that has been amplified in part due to centuries of intense trade in agricultural products, foreign goods, and humans (Fig. 1). Prior to road travel, the Cross River acted like an umbilical cord connecting hinterland to coastline. Trade along the river sparked a chain reaction that allowed art forms to leap across ethnic, national, and international boundaries, feeding ritual associations that defy geographic and ethnic divisions. While the male ritual association Ékpè/Mgbè (the Leopard Society) is the best-known example of this, there is a vast nexus of performance traditions in which masquerades—including those by women—are abundant. In this article, I will consider patterns of concealing and revealing the female body...