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... desires, including sexual sin, and concealment. In both sexes, Hehe's require each other to hinder all of their desires for sexual intercourse, although they admit to having strong needs for sex. They also believe that people must keep the producers of sexual excitement repressed. The things that produce sexual excitement for them include womens breasts, and the Hehe women keep themselves completely covered at all times.
The most proper people in their culture conceal all enjoyment, not only sexual. They believe that it happiness should not be gloried in. This case study by Edgerton is about tribal sexuality. The Hehe tribe believes that to show off ones sexuality is a violation of a norm.
The Hehe's culture contrasts with Americans culture, in that Americans are often scantily clad when attending parties, the beach, and sometimes school. Moreover, Americans are comfortable expressing their desires for sex in public; one example is nude scenes in movies. Hehe's would regard these movies as improper. It is an extension of the view that sexuality is private, that they do not reveal any type of enjoyment at all.
Edgerton's findings about the Hehe tribe contrast from his findings on the beach. In a study of the beach, Edgerton witnesses many incidents of human sexuality. He found that the men usually gawk at the half nude women on the beach and usually encourage them to talk to them. In the worst occurrences, men wear loose trunks to expose their penises or masturbate on the beach. These cases prove that American society does not have strict norms about public sexuality because the lifeguards do not arrest these people; rather the guards simply attend to them. Edgerton points out the difference between American society's and the Hehe's society's norms dealing with sexuality.
This study of the beach is also an example of relative deviance. The Hehe's would think that Americans behavior at the beach is deviant, to the point that it may be a taboo, but Americans do not even reprimand males at the beach who expose themselves for their behavior. In Another observation of the beach, Edgerton finds that people often have sexual intercourse on towels at the beach. The surprising part is that people at the beach disregard the open sexual behavior. Edgerton compares the indifference of people to the sexual relations on the beach to Siamese twins, when one twin is having sex and the other conducts his or her daily business. The reason why people are so unresponsive to the naked people on the beach, according to Edgerton, is that people isolate themselves.
He believes that people need to be uncaring at times because they do not want to witness other peoples private lives. Another example of Edgerton's research on sexuality is his study of the Zulu warriors. The Zulus did not marry until late in life, and many people believed that the Zulus fierceness came from their sexual repression. Edgerton disagrees with this theory. In Like Lions They Fought, Edgerton writes that Zulus were allowed to have several wives.
Because of this fact, the polygamous Zulu men should have no problem with sexual deprivation. Moreover, the unmarried Zulus did not always refrain from intercourse. The warriors often had young girlfriends, who they were not supposed to have intercourse with, but sometimes did. Edgerton recognizes the fact that sexual repression causes tension and aggression, although this is not the case with the Zulus, because they were probably not sexually restrained. The Zulus are not the only example of sexuality during war. Edgerton explores rape as a source of violence during armed conflicts.
The Bolsheviks could not stand up to Japanese troops, but their outrage was vividly displayed in the city of Nikolatevsk, where they tortured all 700 Japanese people living there and raped the women before killing them. This proves Edgerton's point that enemies rape the women as an alternative to killing in war. It is a cowards way of overcoming a more powerful opponent. During the Boxers Rebellion, the troops raped any more or less attractive women they could find. One U.
S. Marine wrote back that Germans and Russians, in particular, abused and killed these women after raping them. Rape is popular in wars, because the soldiers often leave their wives at home and the warriors sexual repression makes them aggressive towards the enemy women, similar to what people believe of the Zulus. The Gusiis, a different tribe society, had other sexual customs. On their wedding night, Gusiis women refused to go to bed with their grooms. The bride refused to undress or go to bed with her new husband, and then she did everything in her considerable power (including tying her pubic hair over her vagina) to prevent her husband from having sexual intercourse with her.
This shows that the Gusiis connect sex with torture and agony. The Gusiis link between sexuality and pain begins from an early age. When adolescent boys recuperated from their circumcisions, the adolescent girls would sexually taunt them, until they received an extremely painful erection. Edgerton describes the link between pain and sexuality. There is a link between pain and sex in American society, as well. Some people can only reach orgasm if their partner hurts them.
In addition, people go to sadism-masochism clubs to mix pain with pleasure. Edgerton has distinct views on mentally retarded people concerning sexuality. In order for mentally deficient people to act more normal, they must involve themselves with normal sexuality, including the right to bear children. However, the institutions the mentally deficient people are in often hinder their opportunities to have regular sex with people. This means that Edgerton believes that it will be extremely difficult for mentally disturbed people to be normal unless they engage in sexual relations and procreate. In addition, the institutions that they belong to do not allow mentally retarded individuals to have sex.
Another reason that the mentally deficient people will be unable to have normal sex is that people with mental disturbances do not usually involve themselves in male-female relationships or courtship rituals. Edgerton places heavy emphasis on the connection between sex and normality. The Pokot people of northwestern Kenya, for example, place high emphasis on sexual pleasure and fully expect that both a husband and his wife will reach orgasm. If a husband does not satisfy his wife, he is in serious trouble. Pokot men often engage in adulterous affairs, and if a husbands failure to satisfy his wife is attributed to his adultery, when her husband is asleep his wife will bring in female friends and tie him up.
The women will then shout obscenities at him, beat him, and as a final gesture of their utter contempt, slaughter and eat his favorite ox before releasing him. His hours of painful humiliation are assumed to make him henceforth more dutiful concerning his wifes conjugal rights. This understanding of sexuality links with deviance. Edgerton believes that this is not an outrageous act, because the Pokot people see this as normal. Because Americans would see these customs as deviant, the Pokot's understanding of sexuality is different and the acts previously described would not be deviant in Kenya. This is because cultures are different from one another, customs are different from one another, and deviance is different as well.
The research Edgerton conducted on the various cultures norms on suicide and sexuality influenced his theories on these topics. Often there were connections between sociology topics such as anomie and deviance and the understandings of the cultures on suicide and sexuality. Edgerton bases beliefs concerning suicide on research of tribal cultures mentally deficient people, and behavior during wars. His theories on sexuality grow out of investigations on mentally deficient people and societies around the world, including American culture on the beach. Edgerton's broad range of views on suicide and sexuality stem from the case studies in which he involved himself. Bibliography: References Edgerton, R. (1971).
The Individual in Cultural Adaptation. California: University of California Press. Edgerton, R. (1979). Alone Together. California: University of California Press Edgerton, R. (1979).
Mental retardation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Edgerton, R. (1983). Environments and Behavior. Baltimore, Maryland: University Park Press. Edgerton, R. (1988).
Like Lions They Fought. New York: Macmillan. Edgerton, R. (1992). Sick Societies. New York: Macmillan. Edgerton, R. (1997).
Warriors of the Rising Sun. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. Henslin, J. M. (1999).
Sociology: A Down-to-Earth Approach (4 th ed. ). Needham Heights, Massachusetts: Allyn and Bacon Lukes, S. (1972). Emile Durkheim. New York: Harper & Row Pearce, F. (1989). The Radical Durkheim. London: Unwin Hyman
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Research essay sample on University Of California Mentally Retarded
