The Fulani Whip Match

Arguably the most important step within the African rites of passage is the transition ritual. This ritual symbolizes that the young men have

In this culture, as with many others, one becomes a shaman only after being selected by the divine spirits (Sakovich, 2009). Both men and women are able to become shamans, however, they are referred to by different names as each have distinct responsibilities. The men are called ‘Yuta’ while the women are called ‘Nuru’. The women typically “administer public or communal ceremonies while 'Yuta' focuses on the civil or private matters” (“Shaman Portal” 2012”). One distinct aspect of their form of shamanism is their annual festivals which consists of a group of ten females and ten males. On sacred ground the group purifies themselves in the ocean water and performs a religious ritual to summon a goddess from across the sea. Following these actions, the group "hikes to a small settlement at the top of a nearby mountain to offer rice, sake, fish, and other foods to the divinities" (Sakovich

Rituals marked important sites for the creation of gender identity. Ritual activities provided the stage settings for women and men to carry out socially appropriate behaviors marking key points along the moving edge of their life course. In the process, rituals posited a set of gender expectations that were complicated by the realities of everyday life, for ritual practices embodying definitions of masculinity and femininity were alive to other variables such as age, class, personal circumstances, or changing political relationships. Men and women constructed both each other’s honor and gender identity by means of a complicated ‘network of oppositions and dependencies’. Shows a view of gender constructs alongside the practical relationships and tasks that bound men and women together.

The children of the Chumash also engaged in certain rites of passage into adulthood, and the mothers had rituals before giving birth. When a Chumashan mother began to experience labor she would dig a shallow hole in the ground, and then light a fire in the hole to make it warm. Finally, she would extinguish the fire right before birth and line the hole with grass to deliver the baby. After the baby was born, its nose was broken because that would make the child more attractive. For the transition into manhood the young boys would drink a hallucinogenic drink known as a tolache, while being supervised by the shaman where they would experience a vision and be given a guardian spirit (Sutton, 2012). Young girls would undergo a similar process with the addition of following food taboos on meat and salt when they first began to menstruate. Sutton (2012) states that at about 15 years of age girls would marry and at about age 18 boys would marry.

3. Characterize the initiation ritual. How do you think it compares to the “real” ritual – if such a ritual exists?

The girls puberty ceremonial is a huge tradition that transforms the young girls into mature Apache women. They do this ceremony because it has been the way their ancestors ritually accepted girls change into women in their society. The anthropologist main role is to observe and record what is going on. She practices participant-observation because she lives among them

In addition the ceremony is also a milestone in the lives of many young men in the tribe. Each year the boys who have reached the age of manhood voluntarily subject their bodies to four days of fasting, abstinence, and torture as part of preparation to become warriors and respected men within their tribe. The men considered the bravest in the community have subjected themselves to the torturous process many times.

They are put through series of rituals of initiation. Using a razor and a stick of wood they slice the skin to make some what rounded scars that form a pattern also known as Gar marking performed by Shamans. The men usually do this on their face which consists of 6 long cuts from ear to ear, women’s scars are mostly on their body or stomach, around their naval.

Rituals around the world all teach valuable lessons that help initiates see the value and importance of life. Each culture has different rituals that provide experiences for their youth to learn these valuable lessons of life. Many coming of age rituals are intense procedures. The Amazon's Satere Mawé youth enter adulthood through the bullet-ant glove initiation, teaching courage and endurance, and the crocodile scaring ritual that the men from the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea participate in teaches them pain and accomplishment.

This study examines Horace Miner’s essay “Body Rituals Among the Nacirema. While using the participant observation approach, he gives us a new perspective on the daily behaviors within this group of people. Exploring ethnocentrism and how we view cultures outside of our own.

Kicking, punching and biting, who ever won the struggle for power won, who ever lost was sometimes beat to near death.

In Chapter 6, Levi tells how Kapos, "beat us from pure bestiality and violence, but others beat us when we are under a load almost lovingly, accompanying the blows with exhortations, as cart-drivers do with willing horses" (67).

* Does the ritual seek to have practical outcomes (health, safety, prosperity)? Social outcomes (a change in status)? Emotional outcomes (feelings)?

One of these rituals shows just how women hold more power in Wogeo than in other parts of the word, the incising of the penis. All the males of Wogeo practice artificial menstruation to mimic the natural menstruation of women. Artificial menstruation is done because it is believed that the exiting blood takes the toxins with it and artificial menstruation needs to be done every so often to remain healthy and spiritually clean. Many of the men consider women lucky to get there period naturally. Also, in a social aspect, men are seen to be particularly helpless until women came along. This is told by stories of the culture heroes which mostly consisted of women.

p. 484). It is a method of making this transition from girl to woman easier.