Beaded jewelry is a broad category of African gifts with tribal connections.
Authenticity has to be the first consideration in selecting gifts that celebrate African tribal heritage. This can be difficult when you shop online and can not directly examine the items before you buy. It's even harder to be sure that such sources are respectful of tribal interests, whether maintaining present populations' access to heritage materials or ensuring that artisans are paid fairly for their work. Both authenticity and respect are ensured when you shop with fair-trade-certified merchants that tell you who makes their products. Such merchants also provide the widest range of products and prices. Note all prices quoted are as of December, 2010.
Jewelry
Artisans in Burkina Faso wove vinyl waste in traditional patterns over native grass and One World Projects sold the bracelets for $2.50 each. The company also offered multi-strand bracelets of glass beads on camel leather from Mali for 10 times that price and less traditional jewelry from Mali and Ghana. Ten Thousand Villages offered silver jewelry by Tuareg artisans in Niger at prices ranging from $44 to $145.
Tribal Life Items
Baskets woven in tribal colors and patterns may be both useful and decorative. SERRV International, for example, offered a 15-inch deep basket from Zorbisi in Upper East Ghana in vibrant black & white and tangerine bands for $46. Artisans in Congo carved traditional two-sided wedding cups from avocado wood, which Ten Thousand Villages made available to other continents for $34. The same merchant invited customers to sit like Douala chiefs in coastal Cameroon on stools carved each from a single block of Iroko wood for $165.
Musical Instruments
Drums, such as the 25-inch Djembe Gathering Drum offered by Ten Thousand Villages ($295) from Burkina Faso, are easily identified with African tribes. The same merchant also offered a smaller Djembe drum, with carvings, for $195 as well as a thumb piano, also from Burkina Faso, for $14.
Honoring Tribal Wisdom
Organizations serving traditional communities in Africa, such as the monks of Don Bosco in Kenya, collect proverbs and wisdom from their hosts' folk traditions and publish them in affordable forms such as the page-a-day calendars "African Wisdom on the Sacred," "African Wisdom for Life" and "African Wisdom on Leadership" published by Don Bosco Printing Press and sold by Ten Thousand Villages for $12.00 each. The calendars are timeless gifts, since they display only month and date and can therefore be reused.
