Cultures throughout time and around the world have established specific landmarks for the lives of their participants, milestones that mark major thresholds between stages of life. The timing of some is arbitrary, based simply on the individual's decision to marry, for example, while others stem from inevitable changes we experience as result of being living organisms--birth and death.
These thresholds are usually embedded in a matrix of traditional customs and activities--rites of passage, sometimes including changes in physical appearance-- mutilation, tattooing, or changes in hairstyle, clothing, or privilege. In some cultures, passage from one level to another requires learning a new language or accepting a new circle of friends and associates.
Most importantly, when a boy or a girl, a man or woman goes through such a passage and its concomitant rituals, both the person in question and his or her entire culture understand that any other person passing through the cultural gateway undergoes a similar, profound change. Rites of passage are not, like birthday parties, mere games that offer an opportunity to sing a couple of songs and give some nice gifts to a friend. These rites are fundamental stages in human development that provide explicit, serious acknowledgement that the person who was, no longer is; that in that person's place is a new human being with new awareness, potential, obligations, and responsibilities.
Conversely, in those cultures where rites of passage have been blurred, forgotten, or purposely destroyed, the resulting cultural gap contributes to a disruption of life processes. That is, without clear landmarks, the path through life becomes a highway without markers in an empty landscape, confused and confusing.
It is difficult for anyone from one culture to understand or appreciate the rituals of another. Some seem cruel to the outsider, but for the young persons undergoing the ritual, the rite of passage is a proud moment in which there is not the slightest question of what they have become: now, only now, are they men and women.
There are cultures in which passage into manhood requires the killing of a dangerous animal or perhaps another man. In some, the young boy-become-man learns a new "man" language or must adopt a new set of relationships with his mother, potential wives, other clan members, or women who are potential mothers-in-law.
Such customs may strike us a bizarre, exotic, terrifying, even barbaric, but whatever else they are, they are vivid and unforgettable moments of passage within those cultures. Obviously, other cultures look with amazement on our customs, practices that seem as ordinary to us as obtaining a driver's license or graduating from high school.
It is much more difficult for us to understand or even to detect the rites of passage of our own culture. This comes about in part because our rites of passage are relatively subdued. They are so inextricably a part of our day-to-day lives that we scarcely notice them, in part because they are in a condition of major decay and confusion.
Finally, our ability to detect and understand our own rites of passage is confounded because we have
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