Male Cults Revisited: The Politics of Blood Versus Semen

Allen, Michael

doi:10.1002/j.1834-4461.1998.tb02665.x

Cited by 6 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…The notion of gift or endowment as it pertains to human semen has previously been studied by anthropologists (Bonnemère 1990; Allen 1998), historians (Ricco 1994) and by novelists (Tournier 1995). In his novel Les météores , the acclaimed French writer Michel Tournier gives voice to a homosexual man who asserts that fellatio is like ‘a communion to the milk of a sacred root’ (1995, 37).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The anatomy of a forbidden desire: men, penetration and semen exchange

Holmes

Warner

2005

Nursing Inquiry

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The rising popularity of unprotected anal sex (bareback sex) among men who have sex with men (MSM) is perplexing healthcare providers working in sexual health clinics. Epidemiological research on the topic overlooks several socio-cultural and psychological dimensions. Our research attempts to construct an appropriate theoretical edifice by which we can understand this sexual practice. In order to achieve this objective, a qualitative design was selected and 18 semiconductive in-depth interviews were carried out with barebackers from five European and North American cities. We then analyzed the data using two theoretical approaches that were sensitive to the issues of desire, transgression and pleasure. These theories are those of the late French psychoanalyst, Jacques Lacan, and those of poststructural thinkers, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari. These theoretical frameworks helped shed light on the significance of bareback sex, and can potentially influence healthcare providers in gaining a better understanding not only of their clients, but also of their own role in the circuitry of desire at work within bareback. We found that while the exchange of semen constitutes a dangerous and irrational practice to healthcare professionals, it is nevertheless a significant variable in the sexual lives of barebackers that needs to be taken into consideration in the provision of healthcare services.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The anatomy of a forbidden desire: men, penetration and semen exchange

Holmes

Warner

2005

Nursing Inquiry

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“…Other ethnographies in which semen-ingestion is undertaken, which also includes the practice of anal-intercourse and masturbation in conjunction with rubbing the collected semen into the initiate's body, had similar understandings of the importance both symbolically and literally for the development of 248 A. Shand masculinity (Allen 1998). The semen contains within it an agency and power which exists outside of the body and independent to the creator of it.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Semen Anxiety: Materiality, Agency and the Internet

Shand¹

2007

Anthropology & Medicine

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Semen is a potent cultural symbol of masculinity. The social life of semen is poorly understood because of the intensely personal nature of its being. But the Internet has opened up new avenues for people to explore sensitive issues without disclosing their identity. This paper examines a set of questions submitted anonymously for answering by a medical team over a three month period to a UK-based consumer health website. The questions are analysed for emergent themes and these are divided into three groups: those concerning the material quality of semen; semen relating to masturbation; and those that concern semen and potency. It argues that far from being a phenomenon isolated to non-western cultures, semen anxiety is present in the UK in the twenty-first century and is the expression of anxieties surrounding shifting gender roles and masculine identities.

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“…Theorizing in this vein is portrayed in Allen's (1967) early comparative survey on male cults and initiations. Allen, however, did recognize that there were variations in the Highlands and sought to explain them in terms of warfare, social structure, and exchange practices, and he has more recently reconsidered the same issues from the perspective of indigenous concepts of semen and blood (Allen 1998).…”

Section: The Collaborative Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Power and Placement in Blood Practices

Stewart¹,

Strathern²

2002

Ethnology

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Anthropologists writing on the Highlands societies of Papua New Guinea have stressed the variable importance of ideas of menstrual pollution as markers of gender relations. This article suggests an alternative approach to these ideas, emphasizing instead aspects of power, placement, complementarity, collaboration, and the moral agency of both genders. Turning to the ethnographic work of the 1960s, we contrast the writings of Salisbury and Meggitt and discuss the usefulness of the "three bodies" concept of Lock and Scheper-Hughes in the comparative analysis of body substances and their meanings in this region. The use of a collaborative model is helpful in such an overall analysis. (Bodily substances, cosmos, gender, menstruation, power)' Throughout the world menstrual blood is seen as a powerful bodily fluid in many contexts, especially in its recognized role as a source of fertility, and it is a significant part of a cosmic cycle of life and death. Menstrual blood may be used, like other powerful bodily fluids, in beneficial ways or in lethal ways. In interpreting the use of this fluid the agency of both women and men needs to be considered. Likewise, the cosmological contexts in which bodily substances are regarded must be explored so as to provide a better understanding of how these fluids are seen in all their dimensions (Stewart and Strathern 2001a, 1999a). Buckley and Gottlieb (1988:7) discuss the diverse practices encompassed by a category such as menstrual taboos. These taboos affect the behavior of others in addition to the menstruating woman, and these actions have "cosmological ramifications" (Buckley and Gottlieb 1988:9). They say there is a sort of androcentric bias in the interpretation that anthropologists have frequently made of taboos generally. For example, if women are prohibited from touching male hunting gear, this is interpreted as representing male dominance, but if men are not allowed to touch something in the female domain, this is often interpreted as a sign of female inferiority (Buckley and Gottlieb 1988:14). Rather than demonstrating absolute representations of superiority/inferiority, taboos such as those surrounding menstruation are best understood through observation and interpretation of the specific ways that taboos operate within a local cultural logic. This article uses examples from the Highlands of Papua New Guinea to explore this topic. We use ethnographic records of other anthropologists and draw on materials from our three field areas in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea, the Hagen, Duna, and Pangia (Wiru) areas. The Hagen area belongs to the populous Wahgi Valley in the Western Highlands Province, with a population today of around 100,000 and an administrative center in Mount Hagen township. The Pangia area, inhabited by more than 20,000 speakers of the Wiru language, lies to the south of Hagen and belongs to the Southern Highlands Province, whose headquarters is in the 349

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Male Cults Revisited: The Politics of Blood Versus Semen

Cited by 6 publications

References 23 publications

The anatomy of a forbidden desire: men, penetration and semen exchange

The anatomy of a forbidden desire: men, penetration and semen exchange

Semen Anxiety: Materiality, Agency and the Internet

Power and Placement in Blood Practices

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