Guardians of the Flutes, Volume 1: Idioms of Masculinity - Paperback

by Gilbert Herdt (Author)

In the first systematic documentation of New Guinea rituals of manhood, Gilbert Herdt places the homosexual customs of the Sambia in their ecological and ideological contexts while exploring what they mean to the individuals who practice them. Raising a host of issues concerning gender identity, hostility between the sexes, and the relationships between myth, culture, and personal experience, Herdt provides a vivid and convincing portrait of how Sambia men experience their sexual development.

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This unique study of boy-inseminating rituals among the Sambia of New Guinea challenges our deepest assumptions about the role of culture in understanding homosexuality and gender-identity development.