Reflection Paper 5

Education and Rite of Passage

Every culture has there own kind of “rite de passage”. For instance, in Hispanic culture, fifteen year olds have a Quince. A Quince is a coming of age celebration for a young woman primarily. It’s when a celebration that a girl is now becoming a women. A debutant ball has the same meaning; it’s when an adolescent is becoming an adult. Graduating from high school is another rite of passage because it’s a completion of elementary and secondary education. Africa has an extreme way of initiating a child into adulthood. In Kenya their rite of passage is the circumcision or trimming of the genital organs of both sexes. They go through months of preparation and a handful of rituals right before the operation. The person to operate had been prepared to do since they were child. The Sambia has an odd rite of passage, that involves the men leading homosexual and heterosexual lives. According to Professor Michael Moffatt, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, the “whole point of all their activities, as their culture defines them, is to get ready as strong developed men…” And it is believed that 20 or 30 nearby cultures had the same sexual beliefs. Overall, all these different rites of passage teaches these adolescents an important meaning about their culture.

Rites of passage ceremonies have a lot to with teaching learning because the adults are teaching these young adults the ways of life. They are instructing there pupils how to become a mature adults and preparing them for what’s to become of them in the future. Now child is really left to learn on their own, so it is important that the person instructing is really teaching the child what is vital for them to be successful later on in their adult lives. The Sambia truly believed that semen was very important to human life and must be circulated through both males and females. They even made rituals around that because they think that semen is what keeps men and women healthy and strong, and that would lead them to a successful life. Moreover, according to Arnold van Gennep, who best known for his work regarding to rights of passage, believed in three main components that made up the rites of passage. The first one being segregation, which the common beginning stage, then marginal or luminal rites, and lastly, aggregation which according to van Gennep is the rites of entry and leaving of the intermediate “no-man’s-land”. These steps into a rite of passage is teaches the adolescence that are the ones becoming adults that there’s a lot that goes into being an adult. In western culture, getting your license and a car on your sixteenth birthday is a common ritual. It teaches that teenager the responsibility of owning something important.

There is a lot that goes into a rite of passage, as can be seen. People do learn a lot no matter what culture they come from. The cultural content of each rite of passage varies widely, however in the end each rite of passage has the same kind of meaning behind all the rituals and ceremonies. It’s about learning what there is to know about where you come from and understanding and accepting your background and beliefs. Finally when that adolescent is an adult they would be the one teaching and passing down the rites of passage. The initiations have a lot to with educating because that is what an educator does, they learn from others then pass it down to others who are not as knowledgeable.