Baby Carrier
Geija People, China, Guizhou Province
19th or 20th Century
Cotton, Silk Embroidery
59.7 x 68.6 cm (23 1/2 x 27 in)
Karen A. Bennett
Textiles play an important role in the lives of the Geija people, who, like their neighbors, the Miao, lavish much time and care on making highly colorful and decorative clothing, which their women still wear at certain times. Baby carriers are common to all the Chinese minorities in this region: the baby is lifted onto his mother, and then covered with the embroidered carrier, which is tied on by a cloth strap at the top, and secured by another around the baby’s bottom. This arrangement allows for a good range of movement for the baby, and permits the mother to carry her child along narrow footpaths, and while working in the fields. The baby carriers of the Geija are specifically T-shaped and have small, cloth fills beneath the cross-arm of the T.
Below – A Gejia woman dressed in the style of her community. Southwest China, 2006
