Growing Up Sexually

MALAWI (Lake Nyasa, Chewa, Yao, Ngoni, Lomwe, Mang'anja; ®Nyakyusa)

Index → Africa→ Malawi

In Malawi, female sexual activity is actively promoted through initiation rites that teach girls about sex and encourage experimentation (cf. Horne, 2001)[1].

“In some of the districts, especially those dominated by the Yao tribe, a young girl is told to become 'intimate' with a man after initiation... Among other things girls are taught how to satisfy a man sexually. This encourages unsafe sex. 'These young girls are not ready for sex, either physically and mentally. […] During initiations the boys too are taught about sex and are […] encouraged to have sex after initiation. Quite often these youngsters do not use condoms because they know very little about it. Despite all this it is still a taboo in Malawi for parents to talk to their children openly about sex. As a result they learn about it from initiation ceremonies in rural areas and from magazines and from their peers. […] The Malawian cultural values regarding sex and sexuality tend to emphasise and strengthen the dominance of boys and men and subservience of women and girls”[2].

Thus,

“Initiation ceremonies […] are intended to train boys and girls in acceptable behaviour but are also loaded with lessons on theory and practice of sex, the latter before marriage. […] Traditional initiation is the counseling of boys and girls by elders on acceptable code of behaviour.  This marks the end of childhood and the beginning of adolescence or, in some cases, adulthood.  The practice is common in most parts of Malawi except in the Northern Region where the patrilineal family system predominates.  In some cases the initiates are encouraged to have sex upon graduation as a way of putting into practice the knowledge they have acquired”[3].

“In some of the districts, especially those dominated by the Yao tribe, a young girl is told to become ‘intimate’ with a man after initiation… Among other things girls are taught how to satisfy a man sexually. This encourages unsafe sex. ‘These young girls are not ready for sex, either physically and mentally. It is against this background that responsible leaders must have the courage to change some of these harmful cultural norms’, says the [UNICEF] report. […] During initiations the boys too are taught about sex and are also encouraged to have sex after initiation. Quite often these youngsters do not use condoms because they know very little about it. Despite all this it is still a taboo in Malawi for parents to talk to their children openly about sex. As a result they learn about it from initiation ceremonies in rural areas and from magazines and from their peers”[4].

For a Nyasaland boy’s coming of age, Young (1933:p16)[5] observes, “[t]he decisive sign is the erotic dream, and it is only then that the lad reports to a village elder (never to his own father), and the preparations are made for a quite simple ceremony that marks his passage into manhood”. This would happen between age 15 and 18. “The next step is marriage, and while a girl could be selected and negotiated for while still immature, the boy had to be proven man before negotiation for him began”. [Young contests qualifications such as “obscenity” and “indecency” as applied to sexual instructions.]

In a clinical study[6] of adolescent post-abortion patients, the mean age at sexual debut was 15.7 years (SD +/- 1.75), about a year after that at menarche (14.3 years, (SD +/- 1.4)).

Lyons[7] speaks of

“[…] silence, secrecy and denial that surrounds sex and education about it (NAC,, 12 1.2.3.p). The Malawian culture is heavily infused with religious beliefs, namely those of Christianity and Judaism (CIA, 2004). In these religious contexts, sex is often associated with sin, and it this association that seems to have permeated the Malawian culture (NAC,, 49). It is considered extremely inappropriate for young women to be educated about practices which, in theory, they should not be putting to use until marriage (NAC,, 20, c). Among the Malawian youth however, abstinence, though it is still heavily supported in public, is obviously not practiced. Ideas of masculinity, perhaps introduced by the Western media, put pressure on men (and therefore women) to engage in sexual activities at a young age (NAC,, 20 section e, sub section v). In 2003, the average age of first sexual experience in Malawi was 15, yet only 5% of Malawian women claim to have ever used a condom (NAC,, 12 1.2.3.m). It is this practice of secrecy and denial regarding sexual practices that results in the public support of abstinence and the private denial of it, which in turn leads to the exponentially rising numbers of HIV infections within the population of young women. In order to halt the increase in new infections, Malawian girls should primarily be taught to practice abstinence, as religion dictates, but in light of new societal pressures as well as the increased risks associated with unsafe sex, girls must also be educated in an open and comfortable environment about safe sexual practices, an education which must be completed before puberty and reviewed frequently thereafter.

The second practice which we will examine is fisi, also known as hyena, (the Chichewa translation of ‘fisi’). Fisi is a puberty or pre-marital practice that is practiced in some parts of Malawi. Women who have either recently incurred their first menstruation or are soon to be married are taken aside and educated by the village elders about sex. Too often this education lacks discussion of gender equality and focuses on the ‘duty’ of the woman to please the man, an omission which often leads to the acceptance of gender violence and male-dominance, lessening yet further the ability of women to exercise any control, including demanding condom use (NAC,, 38). The harmful effects of this practice are then furthered as the hyena visits them. The hyena is an unidentified male who comes to each woman individually under the cover of night and has sex, often without protection (NAC,, 39)”.

“The Malawian community reinforces gender roles from an early age. In towns and cities girl children are bought dolls and encouraged to know how to carry them on their backs, among other things. Boys, on the other hand are given toys such as cars and trains, which indicate power and wealth. Any feminine tendencies by the male child are admonished with comments such as “osamalankhula ngati mkazi” (do not speak like a woman/female) or “osamangolira zili zonse ngati munthu wamayi” (do not cry so easily as if you are a woman). Such stereotypical socialisation processes are an integral part of a societal package to mould children to fit into categories, which a hierarchical male dominant society wishes to lord over and perpetuate”[8].

Featured: Lake Nyasa, Chewa, Yao, Ngoni; ®Nyakyusa

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

Last revised: May 2005