Growing Up Sexually

 

DOBE JU/’HOANSI  (Botswana)

 

 

Index Africa Botswana Dobe Ju/’Hoansi

 

Featured: G/wi, Hambukushu, Kgalagari, Nharo, Dobe Ju/’Hoansi, (Ba)Katla / (Ba)kgatla,; also®Subiya, ®Tswana, ®Atonga


 

 

Lee (1993:p90-1)[1] quotes a 50-year-old woman on her childhood experiences, probably characteristic of the Dobe Ju:

 

“When a child sleeps beside his mother, in front, and his father sleeps behind and makes love to her, the child watches. Perhaps this is the way the child learns [….]. Then, when he and the other children are playing, if he is a little boy he takes his younger sister and pretends to have sex with her. As he grows, he lives in the bush and continues to play, now with other children, and they have sex with each other and play and play and play […]. Some days I went with them. Sometimes I refused to play, other times I agreed. The little boys entered into the play huts where we were playing and then they lay down with us. My boyfriend came to see me and we lived like that and played. We would lie down together and they would have sex with us”.

 

 


 

 

 

 


 

 

 

Janssen, D. F., Growing Up Sexually. VolumeI. World Reference Atlas. 0.2 ed. 2004. Berlin: Magnus Hirschfeld Archive for Sexology

Last revised: Sept 2004

 



[1] Lee, R. B. (1993) The Dobe Ju/'hoansi.New York: HarcourtBraceCollege Publishers