Page 177 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol III

996 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

sons, and a group of men then comes to collect each boy eties, where initiation rites, if they exist at all, no longer
and take him into the forest. The mothers pretend to serve the function of educating the young person in his
protest. We thus see the separation of the boy from his or her future role as an adult or of conferring adult sta-
old role as child dramatized in the ritual. The initiation tus.The result of this is that young people may be unsure
proper consists of number of physical ordeals and humil- as to what the adult role entails when they have in fact
iations and also intense instruction regarding the various achieved the status of adult. On the other hand, adoles-
taboos that must be observed by adult men in their cul- cents living in large, heterogeneous, changing societies
ture as well as the consequences of nonobservance of the also have a kind of freedom to pursue their own interests
taboos. Upon completion of the rite, boys are viewed as and develop their own talents that a young person living
true warriors and begin to live in a special house reserved in a small, homogeneous, stable society does not enjoy.
for males.The educational aspect of the initiation rite is Sometimes, when the culture at large no longer provides
similarly illustrated by the Chippewa initiation rite for a rite of passage to smooth over some life transition, indi-
adolescent girls, as portrayed in Hilger (1951). In this viduals themselves may evolve their own rites of passage.
indigenous North American Indian society, an adoles- The male adolescent gang has been explained by
cent female, at her first menstruation, is secluded for a Goethals (1967) as an example of an attempt on the part
number of days in a wigwam built by the girl herself.The of youth to map out their own roles and rules when the
isolation of the girl is due to the belief that, as a men- society no longer provides them guidelines.
struating woman, she is dangerous to the community,
who must be protected from her. But also, during her Implications
seclusion the girl is tutored by her mother on her future The presence, importance, and elaboration of both rites
role as an adult woman. of passage in general and adolescent initiation rites in
particular are contingent upon certain features of a soci-
Disappearance of Adolescent ety, which have been described in this article.Thus, rites
Initiation Rites of passage in general, and certain kinds of these rites, are
Wherever the adolescent initiation rite is found and more likely to be found in some kinds of societies and
whatever specific function it performs, it is the older gen- less likely to be found in others.When a society changes,
eration that is in control of the ritual.The payoff for the either by virtue of internal processes or as a result of
young person is that, at the completion of the ceremony, external influence, rites of passage may become more or
the initiate is accorded full status as an adult.This is pos- less prevalent. It is the place of a particular society in its
sible because adolescent initiation rituals tend to be own historical trajectory that seems to most influence
found in small, stable, homogeneous societies. It is in how that society will negotiate the life transitions of
societies of this sort that the adults have knowledge of their members.
moral dictates, community traditions, rituals, practical
Gwen Jessica Broude
knowledge, and so on.Where a society is large, complex,
heterogeneous, and rapidly changing, the knowledge re- See also Adolescence
siding in the older generation is less likely to be relevant
to the younger person. Indeed, in such societies, adoles-
cents may be left on their own to construct their own Further Reading
adulthoods, including what they will be, what they will Brown, J. K. (1963).A cross-cultural study of female initiation rites. Amer-
believe, how they will behave, where and with whom ican Anthropologist, 65, 837–853.
Burbank,V. R. (1997).Adolescent socialization and initiation rites. In C.
they will live, what moral standards they will follow, and
R. Ember & M. Ember (Eds.), Cross-cultural research for social science
so on.This is the case, for instance, in industrialized soci- (pp. 83–106). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.