All-Female Guardians of the Flame Cultural Arts Collective
to accompany
Young Guardians of the Flame
on Mardi Gras Day


On Mardi Gras morning, February 24, Big Queen Cherice Harrison Nelson will lead the Guardians of the Flame Cultural Arts Collective, a new all-female group that includes women from the Mardi Gras tradition and the local African dance community.

In addition, special participants will include Nigerian Elder Phanuel Egejuru, Achebe's biographer and former Loyola English professor; Sula, a member of Zion Trinity and a Medicine Woman who, in her role as a doula, assists with births and deaths so that participants enter and exit the world in a culturally connected manner; Jamilah Muhammed, who will serve as the Big Queen's Royal dancer, a position given to her by the late Big Chief Donald Harrison Sr.; and Wild Woman Kahina, wearing an African hat/crown headpiece, who will mask in a traditional male role, a notion embraced by Big Chief Donald.

The Guardians of the Flame Cultural Arts Collective will depart from 1941 Alvar St. at 6:30 a.m. on Mardi Gras Day and will follow the Young Guardians of the Flame. They will lead a procession to the Harrison Family home two blocks away where Elder Phanuel will do a libation to honor the memory of the late Big Chief Donald Harrison Sr.

The members of the Cultural Arts Collective will celebrate the arrival of Big Chief Kevin, who will step through the same door that Big Chief Donald Harrison Sr., along with his son, future Big Chief Donald Harrison Jr., and his grandson, future Big Chief Brian Nelson, stepped through in 1989 when the Guardians of the Flame made their first Mardi Gras appearance.