Getting to know the Mardi Gras Indians

Once you get a look at a guide book on New Orleans you will read about and see Mardi Gras Indians. You might think that beautiful suits and happy dancing people on  the streets is all what it is about. In the Backstreet Cultural Museum in the Tremé neighborhood we got to know what Mardi Gras Indian culture really is about.

The Black Indian tradition is part of the culture of African Americans who venerate Native American ancestors.

Every year a Mardi Gras Indian sews his suit. This work takes his entire free time, money and passion. The material for a suit – pearls, feathers, canvas, shells, … -  can cost him up to $ 20.000 !

The curator of the Backstreet Cultural Museum says: "To raise funding the chief doesn’t get any financial help neither of companies nor friends or relatives. He has to make his sacrifice to his ancestors all on his own."

Only with the actual work of sewing a chief gets some help by a few people who then spend their weekend in his house working on his suit. Of course he has to offer them food and drinks.

On Mardi Gras day then, after a whole year of sweating and working hard for a pretty suit Mardi Gras Indian chiefs together with their tribes will be on the streets.

Until the 70s there had been fighting between different tribes when their competing chiefs met on the streets. Nowadays the chiefs compete with their suits in an aesthetic way. The chief with the most beautiful suit will be the Chief of Chief and maintain this position for his life time.

Over all there are about 30 tribes at the moment in New Orleans who practice the Mardi Gras Indian tradition.

As our guide in the Backstreet Cultural Museum told us the real Mardi Gras Indian tribes parade in their neighborhoods and not in the city center for the tourists.

Apart from Mardi Gras day (Tuesday before Ash Wednesday) there are other days on which the Mardi Gras Indians parade on the streets, sing and dance:  St Joseph’s Day, and the Super Sundays.

To get more information on the backstreet Cultural Museum click here www.backstreetmuseum.org

Lena