Initiation rituals provide a cultural mechanism for members of a particular culture, usually males, to pass from one developmental stage (youth) to adulthood. In some East African cultures, for...

Initiation rituals provide a cultural mechanism for members of a particular culture, usually males, to pass from one developmental stage (youth) to adulthood. In some East African cultures, for example, 12-year-old boys live alone and isolated for four years. When they return, they are circumcised without anesthesia by a stone knife. They must not flinch. Pueblo Indian (Hopi, Zuni) kachinas whip the boys with yucca whips until they bleed (kachinas are animal-human hybrids, also elders in disguise). Others use nasal incision to stimulate bleeding. Like these other cultures, American adolescent males have devised numerous risky and often grotesque ways to initiate each other into manhood. But, unlike other cultures, American adolescents perform these by themselves. Everywhere else, initiation is undertaken only with adult supervision to make sure it remains safe and doesn’t get out of control.