Grasia - Economy



Grasias are generally vegetarian but have been known occasionally to enjoy nonvegetarian foods. Maize is the food staple, which is grown by every Grasia who has land for cultivation. It is prepared by cooking the coarse maize flour with buttermilk and adding some salt to it. Sometimes breads of maize flour are also prepared. When little wheat and maize are available the Grasias use inferior grain like kuro (Italian millet?) as a substitute, and when necessary jungle roots and tubers are used.

Men primarily do the work that requires the most physical strength, such as plowing and other agricultural work, preparing fences for the fields, construction of houses, felling of trees, and some household work such as churning of the curds for butter. Women do the cooking, tend to the cattle and milk the cows, buffalo, and goats, bring drinking water, grind grain, etc., and look after the children. There are no social stigmas attached to either men's or women's work. Women veil their faces in the presence of elder male relations of their husbands, but they are generally free to move about in society like men and are not considered inferior to men. Girls share a similar freedom with boys. Once they are grown up they have the freedom to choose their own husbands. The largest sign of female social oppression is that women aren't allowed to own property on their own, not even if it was left to them by their father.


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