Growing Up Sexually

De Flacourt[1] (1658; as cited by Karsch-Haack, 1901[1983:p251]; Karsch-Haack, 1911:p178)[2] on Madagascar: “[…] schon kleine Knaben und kleine Mädchen trieben Liebespiele im Beisein ihrer Eltern, welche darüber lachten und selbst dazu Anreiz gaben; bisweilen trieben kleine Buben, ohne Scham, in Gegenwart ihrer Eltern, ausschweifende Spiele mit Kälbern und Zicken”[3]. Audebert (quoted by Ploß and Bartels, II; Bloch, 1902, I:p254) also noted Paradoxia in Madagascar. According to Sibree (1880:p39, 43)[4], premarital freedom on Madagascar was noted for, among others, the Hovas and Valave.

Predelli[5] examined the sexual control in a Lutheran boarding school for girls established by Norwegian women missionaries in Madagascar in 1872.

“Among the Sakalaves of Madagascar there are certain boys called _sekatra_, as described by Lasnet, who are apparently chosen from childhood on account of weak or delicate appearance and brought up as girls. They live like women and have intercourse with men, with or without sodomy, paying the men who please them”[6].

Featured: Tanala, Merina

Additional references:

Smyth, B. (2000) The Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Southern Africa. ECPAT International, p62-9 [fulltext at http://www.ecpat.net/eng]

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

Last revised: Oct. 2004

[1] De Flacourt, E. (1658) Histoire de la Grand Isle Madagascar. Paris: L’Amy

[2] Karsch-Haack, F. (1911) Das Gleichgeschlechtliche Leben der Naturvölker. München: E. Reinhardt. Also by Bloch, I. ([1933]) Anthropological Studies in the Strange Sexual Practises of All Races and All Ages. New York: Anthropological Press, p45-6

[3] Freimark (1911:p267) quotes the same Flacourt as observing the following: “Einige Male begingen kleine Knaben in Gegenwart ihrer Eltern mit Kälbern und Böcken gewisse Handlungen, ohne daß man sie dafür schalt”. See Freimark, H. (1911) Das Sexualleben der Afrikaner. Leipzig: Leipziger Verlag

[4] Sibree, J. (1880) Relationships and the names used for them among the peoples of Madagascar, J Anthropol Instit Great Britain & Ireland 9:35-50. See also Crawley (1929:p12, 13), who cites Ploss et al. ([1927:p24]) in arguing that “children have free intercourse at a very early age, and their parents take a pleasure in watching them”.

[5] Predelli, L. N. (2000) Sexual Control and the Remaking of Gender: The Attempt of Nineteenth-Century Protestant Norwegian Women to Export Western Domesticity to Madagascar, J Women’s Hist 12,2:81-103

[6] Ellis, H. (1927) Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume II: Sexual Inversion. 3^rd ed. Quoting Annales d'Hygiène et de Médecine Coloniale, 1899, p494 [http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/6/1/13611/13611-8.txt]