The ocean. Iemanjá – remember when I mentioned her while talking about the colors white and yellow and the New Year’s Eve ceremony at the beach? She is the African goddess of the ocean, the salt waters. She appears throughout the diaspora and is known by various names across the African continent. She is the great mother of us all. She protects the pregnant and watches over childbirth. She’s a concentration or manifestation of feminine power, fertility and reproduction.