Sex And Sexuality And Its Impact On Health - Essay Example

Sex and Sexuality: A Cultural Taboo and Its Impact on Health By (Module and number) Sex and Sexuality and Its Impact on Health It has been proven by history that sexuality has always been an integral part of human existence. The terminology had just been coined in the modern times but that did not stop people from studying and looking deep into the concept of sexuality. Morals and religions have delved into that topic as a very important aspect that connects human beings to their environment and to divine beings. As symbolism had been known as part of the colourful cultures and traditions, sexual symbols had been present in certain religions as people celebrated in festivity. Take the ancient Greek culture as an example wherein the people respect Eros as a source of inspiration and consider sexuality as a divine thing (Nye, 1999, p. 2). Despite the existence of rich sexual symbols in the ancient religions and cultures, there were also cultures that punished people for committing sexual acts and talking about sexuality as they considered it as taboo. The paper will define sexuality first and goes deep into the sexuality issues in Hausa society and the implications on their health. Ancient Western societies had almost depicted sexuality as a taboo wherein it was considered to corrupt the very nature of human beings turning them into a bestial state. As a cure, rituals must be performed to clean-up the existence of sexuality (Nye, 1999, p. 2). Some of the rituals were performed during menarche as those girls were secluded under the supervision of the older women to teach the younger ones about the sexual norms in their society. In other societies, women were not allowed to have sexual intercourse during their menstruation. Other rituals on sexuality involves the childbirth as men were excluded during the child delivery while other societies force the husband to imitate the childbirth at the same time his wife does it. Also circumcision is a sexual ritual for cleansing and proven to bring good hygiene for people backed by scientific studies (Siann, 1994, p. 120). In particular, Christianity had not tolerated the issue of sexuality as sex is only done within the concept of marriage and for procreation (Goss and Strongheart, 1997, p. 7). Perhaps the Christian church does not tolerate sex outside marriage as it may lead to more severe moral, personal and societal problems like broken families, vices and abuses. The struggle in the issue of human sexuality had existed in the twentieth century as people thought that it is an unimportant topic for formal studies in the field of social sciences. Since it is a part of the physical body, people thought it would be sufficient to let the biological and medical sciences to take care of the studies for that sensitive issue (Parker and Aggleton, 1999, p. 1). The view changed in the recent decades when people started to find out the social perspective of sexuality was important as liberalization occurred especially in the Western nations. Despite the liberalization that occurred, acceptance of the concept of sexuality is still a challenge since many people hold prejudices toward that sensitive topic which affect the social tolerance towards it (Wilton 2000, p. 1). In sexuality and stereotype, it would help if sex and gender are differentiated first as they are both involved with the issue of stereotype. Sex pertains to the biological differences of men from women while gender is more of a societal role or it is a cultural aspect (Weiten et al., 2012, p. 339). Sex focuses on the physiological separation of males from females while gender pertains to the differences in roles between men and women. Gender stereotypes are somehow related to the above generalization, but it focuses on the societal roles of males and females. Those stereotypes are common beliefs regarding behaviours and characteristics of a male or a female (Estes and Ewert, 1988, quoted in Gondek, 2008, p. 50; Duncan 2010). Those standards may not apply to all people as roles are ever-changing. Gender stereotypes lack alternatives and are very stiff in labelling members of a group to be identical. In America, men are said to be strong and rigid while women are considered to be weak and fragile (Williams and Best 1990, quoted in Shepard, 2005, p. 284). The stereotypes tend to separate men from women, but failed to consider that there are exceptions to the rule. The study focuses on the cultural group known as Hausa of Nigeria. Most of Hausas are living in the northern part of Nigeria, but they can also be seen in other places like Ghana, Benin Republic, Timbuktu and Togo. Hausa is the name of an ethnic group and the name of a language respectively. According to history, various factors are used to pertain to Hausa like cultural qualities, social norms, language, and religion (Khaleel, 1996, p. 37). Recently, Hausa made up about 30 million of the 162 million people living in Nigeria making them the biggest ethnic group in West Africa. Their major region of occupancy which is the northern part of Nigeria is known as Hausaland. For centuries, they have been known as skilful traders especially for long distance trading and they usually have crafts and leather to trade with Middle East people for gold. Despite of the declaration of English as the official language of Nigeria, Hausa remained to be a large influence among Nigerians as the Hausa language is becoming a primary language for people in the northern portion of Nigeria. They also become strong political and cultural influence to West African people (Joshua Project, n.d.). The map below provided by Yoo (n.d.) shows the places occupied by Hausa in the country of Nigeria. Figure 1. Map of Nigeria showing the Places of Hausa Society (Yoo, n.d.). In the society of Hausa, they give a large importance on children as they are important in their institution they call purdah. The male-female interaction is focused on by purdah and it puts certain limits to the allowed actions for both men and women. Hausa women normally remain in purdah or compound except for visiting their relatives and female friends, for attending rituals and ceremonies like marriage and funeral, and for receiving medical treatments. Men are also limited by purdah as they cannot enter the house of one another. They are also very busy with their work far away that they even do not have the opportunity for frequent interaction with their spouses. The control of purdah applies only to adults as children enjoy greater freedom. They can visit the houses of other people without any restrictions or problems, and they are not even obliged to practice some formal greeting behaviour like courtesy in front of adults. They can go to the houses of friends or even strangers in search of playmates, and they can even do some basic selling or carry messages. Women then can do some independent livelihood in cooperation with their children. Surely the gender roles of adult men and women cannot be identified solely or on their own without the existence of the unique roles of their children to complement them (Corsaro, 2005, pp. 33-34). For other societies, they may find that characteristic of Hausa children to be undesirable as they do not have any formal greeting behaviour barge in and out of the homes of other people without any restrictions. In terms of education, Hausa people give importance to it as they are able to transfer their values and skills to the next generation. In general, Hausa has three kinds of education: traditional education, Islamic education, and Western education. Traditional education is set in an informal setting wherein the culture and tradition of the tribe are taught to the Hausa children. The parents then pass their skills to their children. In Islamic education, it involves the traditions of Muslims and Qur’an. The Western education is set in a formal setting wherein the Western missionaries make use of it to convert the Africans into Christians. Islamic schools and Western schools are almost similar in structure and they both have graduations held at the end of the year (Khaleel, 1996, pp. 44-47). That shows how education is a great influence in the customs and traditions of Hausa. As part of Hausa culture, females become adults when they become married and traditionally they observed it even at the age of 11. Married age then changed because of the Western education in Nigeria. Despite of that, prostitution still occur (Schildkrout, 1986, pp. 131-136). Without the Western education to affect the marrying age of Hausa women, probably getting married at a young age would still be a cultural norm among Hausa in the twenty-first century. That may have grave consequences as proven by various studies around the world. They are more prawn to death at childbirth with high chance of losing their children. At the same time, they also lose their education and employment opportunities as motherhood is time-consuming and less work are available for them. Their own future and the future of their children will be jeopardized. Since they usually marry older men who have sexual experience, the young women are more prawn to HIV (Gruskin, 2009, p. 119). For Hausa mothers, they have high risk of maternal deaths with a ratio of 1,000 per 100,000 live births (Wall 1998, p. 341). The risk is big that can be attributed to many factors that exist in Nigeria. The factors that are suspected to be the cause of the high risk are purdah, Islamic culture, strict paternal society, pregnancy at a young age, harmful traditional medical practices, and lack of facilities, political corruption and bad economy (Wall 1998). One of the factors is purdah which is the traditional seclusion for married women. With seclusion, the access to the healthcare is less for them while they are at-risk of STIs and HIV especially when their husbands are polygamous or with relationships outside marriage. The secluded women may also engage in sexual affairs outside of wedlock out of their rage against the rigidness of the social system (Germain et. al., 1992, p. 307). The seclusion also had influences from the Islamic culture on how they handle women that had affected their access to healthcare (Gannon and Pillai, 2010, p. 316). At the same time, strict patriarchal society is influenced by the Islamic culture that produced the societal system where there is gender inequality. In that case, women are not allowed to talk about reproductive health (Anderson, 2005, p. 59). Homosexuality is still present in Hausa despite of its rigid Islamic tradition. It is an inversion of the traditional image of a heterosexual male. Those people are called ‘yan daudu which surfaces as an alternate reality for a temporary escape in a rigid society (Salamone, 2007). They are condemned somehow by the strict society as those males are very open with their sexuality as they look for other men (Maynard, 2007, p. 97). The presence of ‘yan daudu is not a major issue in Hausa society but their presence may bring about some negative effects to their population. Also, the low tolerance of their society to the existence of homosexuality may give several physical illnesses to the homosexuals indirectly. With psychological pressures and stress inflicted by a society, physical diseases then follow to manifest to those discriminated like the homosexuals (Cole et al. 1996, p. 243). Worrying as a result of the societal pressures may then weaken the body making a homosexual susceptible to diseases. Although the strict Muslim tradition is there that may cause the existence of homosexuals, it is still under the debate whether a strict concept of homosexuality can be established (Essien & Aderinto 2009, p. 122). Another concern is that HIV epidemic may be caused by the growing number of homosexuals in the society of Hausa and their growing number can be attributed to the strict society (Gaudio, 2009). It can be concluded that Hausa society had been influenced by Muslims and lately by the Westerners through formal education which also bring about some effects into the views on sexuality and health of the members of their society. The limited power given to women in their society is one of the factors that bring about the rise in maternal deaths. Also homosexuality may be present in their society, but it is not yet widely recognized. Bibliography Anderson, Barbara. (2005) Reproductive health: women and mens shared responsibility. USA: Jones and Bartlett. 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