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EveryFaceShape

Living tradition, Ethiopia

Jinka and the Lower Omo Valley

The market town for the Lower Omo peoples of Ethiopia, among them the Mursi, whose women wear clay lip plates.

Jinka is the main town for the Lower Omo Valley of southwest Ethiopia, home to peoples such as the Mursi, Surma, Hamar, Karo and Dassanech. Mursi and Surma women are known for lip plates, clay or wooden discs worn in the lower lip. Body and face painting with clay and chalk, and scarification, are also part of Omo traditions. The Lower Valley of the Omo is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The lip plate

A Mursi girl's lower lip is cut in her teens, and the opening is stretched over months with larger plugs until it can hold a disc, often of fired clay. Women describe the plate in terms of beauty, adulthood and marriage; it is worn at important times and removed for eating and sleeping. Practice has become a matter of choice, and many younger women do not wear one.

Tourism and debate

Since the 1990s, tour groups have driven from Jinka to Mursi villages to photograph women with lip plates, paying per photograph. Researchers and community members have described how this can turn tradition into a performance for visitors and put pressure on women to keep or exaggerate it. The South Omo Research Centre and Museum in Jinka shows the region's cultures in their own terms.

Guides of Jinka and the Lower Omo Valley

Lip plateWorn by Mursi and Surma women of the OmoLabretThe lip plate is a large form of labretAfrican scarificationPractised among Omo Valley peoples

Photo credits on this page

The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.

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