Men, can you imagine drinking semen during the one stages in which you undergo to become a man? Gilbert Herdt, who is a Anthropology professor goes into many details about the Sambia tribe, which is located in Papua Guinea. During the process of becoming a man in the Sambia tribe, boys had to go through stages that might be labeled as a taboo in the eyes of others that are not part of this culture . The term “boy” is considered to be a feminine factor in the Sambia tribe. Therefore, in order to transform into a man, males are removed from all females at a young age, in order to prepare them for their first encounters with a woman and will be looked at as a Sambia warrior.
Normally, men/boys are targeted to fulfill their woman’s every desire. Now, women are the ones who are seek men to feel their sexual desires. Just as men are separated from women, women are also isolated from their potential husbands. The different stages, that help the “boy” transform into a man, might be looked at as homosexual acts in American culture. This process of initiation from boy to man is also known as masculinity, wherein men are “reborn” from men and are taught many important things such as that woman are dangerous and emasculating.
Stage One and Two
Once the boys are taken from their mother, they are roughed up, tested, physically abused by their group leaders. The beatings are a continuous with many chants, which helps the closer step into becoming a warrior, these beatings are steps toward puberty. In addition, the boys are told by their group leaders, which are preferably older men, that they will perform oral sex on them. The serves as a significant purpose before the boys can mature into men, unless they ingest semen from their own ancestors. “The sexual heat of a boys mouth, while less than a woman’s vagina, is thought to be stimulated by the expected gift of semen” (Herdt 2010, p.86) While not all the boys are participating in these sexual acts, ( due to their age), these rituals are sometimes related to women’s sexual parts. These rituals are performed outside in the dark places, because some boys go through difficult and painful rituals in order to claim their manhood. From someone who lives in the United States, it’s very surprising to see men participate in homosexual activity without even putting up a fight. In the stage 2, the boys continue their rituals just as in stage 1, but are required to ingest much more semen, because it is told to them it will make them strong individuals. “Semen moves so as to reciprocate the trans of “blood” as a principle of marriage and kinship across generation” (Herbt, 1984, p 87).
Stage Three & Four
During stage three, the boys become bachelors and propagate females in their tribe. This stage signifies their coming of age experience in the community. It is a puberty rite that marks adolescences. In addition, the adolescents are severely beaten, and suffer from nose bleeds, taken to certain trees and are whipped (which is meant to purify them from female inappropriate female interaction that could have happened before they left). “Only after blood is let can the “birth” of the phallus occur, electing the boy to manhood, an irreducible intentional reality of secret masculinity” (Herdt 2010, 86) . They are sometimes required to kill someone during their initiation. After, in the fourth stage, the young man’s father and brother(s) find a woman for him to marry. He will not begin to live with this bride until right her first menstrual period, which happens during puberty. During this time, he learns how to prevent himself from smelling a women’s genital odor, in which he is told not to penetrate too deeply because her urethra it might make him ill. “A ceremony now links the youth’s growth, strength, as that of a specific tree. This is where the youth is now exposed to the women after he has been forewarned about every dangerous thing that a women can posses against a man.” (Herdt, 1984 p. 98
Stage Five & Six
During the fifth stage, men have to complete private ritual practices of nose bleeding by themselves after their wife. During the this stage, many men believed that vaginal intercourse can damage their bodies, because of the release of blood which will affect their health. “By inserting their penises into their wives’ vagina, blood, may penetrate into their urethra. It will then accumulate and” block up” their bodies, weakening them, bringing illness and death” ( Herdt 2006, p 118). In order to keep physical activity with their wives, young men had to shed blood, so that they can get rid of the illness in their bodies. The men in Sambia feel very insecure about their position in marriages, because of their fears of semen depletion, which many of the man still have desires of other men, because many believed that it is safer act then having sex with women. The men keep their knowledge of sexual intercourse with other man hidden from others, because it keeps the bond strong with other men in the tribe. The sixth stage of initiation is where manhood takes place in which a man have proven his masculinity by having a child. “The man is instructed to refrain from any intercourse with the new mother and keep away from the child until it is weaned, a matter of several years. He does not need to bleed his nose anymore unless he has another wife to attend to.” (Herdt, p. 100) He must keep all his secrets of the male cult and be sure never to tell anyone about it, not even his wife because if that was to happen he will be castrated and killed. Man of the men felt ashamed about the acts they committed and was sworn into secrecy.
I chose this topic, because many of the things that I mentioned goes against of what society today believes in, such as men committing sexual acts among each other, which in many cases homosexualityis considered to be taboo.
Herdt, Gilbert. “Log in.” Log in. University of Michigan Press, Feb. 2010. Web. 02 Oct. 2014.
Herdt, Gilbert. “The Sambia: Ritual, Sexuality, and Change in Papua New Guinea.”Google Books. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Oct. 2014.
Exploring the Social Foundations of Sex and Sexuality 