Pascola dancers perform on various occasions, most notably during fiestas. Performances can be very long. For instance, prior to  Palm Sunday and Easter, the Pascolas dance with the Maaso (Deer dancer) from mid-afternoon until the following morning.

There is a Yoeme (the name the Yaqui call themselves) legend stating that the Virgin Mary recruited the Devil’s son to be the first Pascola so that there could be a fiesta. Because the Pascola is said to be dancing in defiance of the Devil, he wears a rosary with a cross, and his mask has a cross on the forehead to ward off evil. Some pascola masks have a second cross on the chin for even greater protection.

Yoemem (plural) say that the cross also represents the sun, and the rim design represents the sun’s rays. Such ideas have caused many non-Indian observers to speculate that the Pascola may well be a pre-Columbian ritual figure who was later co-opted to serve on Christian holidays and rituals.

^{During the late 19th century, there was a deliberate effort on the part of Mexico’s president, Porfirio Diaz, to exterminate the Yoemem/Yaquis as a people, due to their repeated uprisings in reaction to encroachments on their traditional lands by non-Indians.}

^{Many were deported to other areas of Mexico, as slave labor, others fled to Arizona, establishing Yaqui colonies in the areas of Tucson and Phoenix. One of these was Pascua, on the northern edge of Tucson. Since then the Arizona Yoemem have established a Reservation to the west of Tucson, called New Pascua, and they refer to the original barrio as Old Pascua.}

^{In such communities the Yoemem have continued to practice their traditional dances and fiestas. There is a steady flow of visitation between the Arizona Yoemem and their relatives in Sonora, not unlike the persistent connections that have been maintained between Southern African American migrants to the industrialized North and their Southern relations. Due to such traffic, the Arizona Yoemem communities have maintained a continuity of culture with other Yoemem who have re-populated their traditional villages in Sonora.}

Bryan Stevens