The skirt that Karana makes out of cormorant skins represents her comfort with breaking her tribe’s established gender roles. Karana grows up adhering to her tribe’s strict gender expectations, which stipulate that women should gather food and keep house, while men should hunt and fish in addition to making weapons. When Karana finds herself abandoned on the island, she soon discovers that she can no longer adhere to these rules, particularly the rules forbidding women from making weapons. She’s able to find a few weapons that were left behind, but they’re not enough to allow Karana to survive—let alone thrive—on the island.
The cormorant skirt that Karana makes, out of skins from cormorants that she shot herself with a bow and arrows that she made, represents her ability to thrive by stepping outside of her tribe’s rules about what women can and can’t do. While Karana has made a number of lovely skirts out of yucca—a plant fiber that she, as a woman, can gather herself—the fact that she killed the cormorants herself speaks to her comfort with tasks formerly reserved for men. And the cormorant skirt is more beautiful than any skirt Karana has ever made before. Cormorants’ feathers are iridescent, so the black skirt shines green and gold in the sunlight. The skirt itself does several things. It shows off Karana’s skill as a seamstress and allows her to feel even more beautiful and feminine than she ever has before, while also making it clear that she’s comfortable performing—and is extremely competent at—tasks that were once the sole responsibility of the men in her tribe.
The Cormorant Skirt Quotes in Island of the Blue Dolphins
It was dark in the cave, even when the sun was high, so I burned the small fish I had stored. By their light I began to make a cormorant skirt, working every day on it. The ten skins I had taken at Tall Rock were now dry and in condition to sew. All of them were from male cormorants whose feathers are thicker than those of the females and much glossier. The skirt of yucca fibers was simple to make. I wanted this one to be better, so I cut the skins carefully and sewed them with great care.
On sunny days I would wear them with my cormorant dress and the necklace, and walk along the cliff with Rontu.
I often thought of Tutok, but on these days especially I would look off into the north and wish that she were here to see me. I could hear her talking in her strange language and I would make up things to say to her and things for her to say to me.
The Cormorant Skirt Symbol Timeline in Island of the Blue Dolphins
