Rites of Passage

The rites of passages are important because they constitute one crucial phase of the human experience, rites are extremely common on different cultures, one of the first writers that talked about these rites was Van Gennep, he suggested that there are three different types of rites, Separation, Aggregation, and marginal, many of these rites we experience today like for example the rite of aggregation would be the today equivalent to marriage. the concept of rites is very important because its closely linked with transformation, all antique civilizations had initiation rites for young children, most of them involved violent acts, and at the end the boy was transformed into a man, his social class changed, and the child in him died, this kind of transformation it’s very important because it turned children into responsible adults, and that’s something that today’s society lacks thus creating a generation of immature adults who never experience true transformation.
On the three articles that I read there is one common factor they all deal with cultural initiations to adulthood, the first article Facing Mt Kenya, talks about the ritual of female circumcision that takes place in the Gikuyu tribes, the article explains how the practice received strong criticism from Western missionaries that considered it, brutal and barbarian, the missionaries then started to deny students the education based on the practice of irua, once the government intervened they proceeded to fire the teachers that supported the custom, the matter even got to the British Parliament, where the matter was investigated, but what the missionaries and western politicians failed to realized was the importance of this practice in the Gikuyu culture, and how detailed and complex it was, girls weren’t just savagely mutilated, but instead the ritual consisted of a preparation, a ceremonial dance, and when the ritual itself is performed it includes herbs and cold water to numb the pain, this is an example of the collision of two different cultures one being extremely judgmental of the other.
The article Sitting Quietly tells the story of the transformation of young boys into manhood, they are all made to be sacred of the forest thing, the elders make them hide in a tent, were they stay for days hearing tales about the rage of the forest thing, at some point they are told to eat pepper or to drink a sour tasting milk, they do all these things and they never cry they never show weakness because that would make them an easier prey for the forest thing, after a few day they hear the calling of their fathers, the children leave the hut and proceed to walk to the village where they are received with dances and acclamations, this is the first step In a four year journey that would turn them into mature men.
The last article called the Sambia, was the most shocking and disturbing for me talks about the bizarre sexual rituals of the Sambia from New Guinea, their rituals involve homosexual acts between boys and the young males of the tribe, they believe that the older males can give their powers to the boys by performing oral sex on them, they think that by performing oral sex it will help them to become more powerful males and be able to increase their chances to have children, the young boys perform sexual favors on the older teens during a period of time until they themselves grow older and get married and have children, this ritual practice is probably shocking for most westerners, but it shows how different cultures an rituals can become.
I believe that the relationship of rites of passage to formal education is that most rituals serve the purpose of transformation into adulthood, this concept of transformation can take the shape of the rituals mentioned above but on a modern society we can come up with better ways to help kids reach transformation during the critical stages of their lives, for instance by letting them know the importance of their belief systems and how they shape their world, this in my opinion would be an excellent alternative to initiation rituals in the modern era.