The Potters of Buur Heybe, Somalia

Tara Belkin: Director, Cinematographer and Co-Writer; Steven A. Brandt: Co-Writer and Consultant This award-winning ethnographic film documents pottery production and use at Buur Heybe, "The Hill of the Potter's Sand", in southern Somalia. The Potters of Buur Heybe portrays the complete life cycle of earthenware pottery manufacture and use, places the pottery in its social and economic context, and considers the roles of gender, symbolism, agency and religion in the process. Although oral tradition credits women for first discovering the natural qualities of the highly valued local clay, it is only the men who create the wide range of beautifully decorated drinking, cooking and storage vessels. Women quarry and transport the clay to the village where men make and decorate the vessels using the coil method on a foot-turned wooden plate. The pots are fired in open air pyres, and distributed both locally and regionally where they are used, recycled and discarded by farmers, pastoralists, and townspeople. Short, technologically fascinating, and ethnographically rich, Potters of Buur Heybe is an excellent film for both undergraduate and graduate courses in anthropology and archaeology, including methods, technology, material culture, ethnography, and arts.