Jamaican Maroon leader Grandy Nanny — Nanny of the Maroons — is of such importance that her image appears on the $500 Bank of Jamaica currency note.

Courtesy of Capital Foreign Exchange, Washington, D.C.

"Our greatest leader was a woman; her name was Grandy Nanny . . . and because of that I believe the women have always played such a dominant role in Moore Town. The women are the moving spirit of anything that’s good in Moore Town."

— Colonel C.L.G. Harris, leader of the Windward Maroons, Moore Town, Jamaica, 1992

Taioli Mavis, the Ndjuka’s first uman kabiten (female village leader), speaking with Dutch journalist Bart Kamphuis, Suriname, 1994.
Photograph by Harmen Boerboom

"Until now, men have always made decisions for the women. Now women are also involved when decisions must be made about important things."

— Taioli Mavis, Ndjuka uman kabiten (female village leader), Suriname, 1994

Aluku Maroon women using slash-and-burn agricultural techniques to prepare fields for planting, Diitabiki, Suriname, 1995.
Photograph by Bart Kamphuis

"In the food production, everyone works at the field work, at planting . . . women have their jobs and men have their jobs. The men cut the trees down and clear a field, the women hoe the ground, plant the crops, and prepare the food."

— Gaanman Gazon Matodja, paramount leader of the Ndjuka Maroons, Suriname, 1992

Gold mining and logging are contemporary occupations for Ndjuka Maroon men.

Men standing by a dali or lonton (wooden dredging device) used to wash gold from soil, Selakiki, Suriname, 1995.
Photograph by Bart Kamphuis