SENOUFO (IVORY COAST) 

 

 

 

 

Index → Africa→ Ivory Coast → Senoufo

(Senoufo, Guro) 

 

 

One of the main acts of male initiation ceremonies to the Poro is a ritual intercourse between the neophytes and their symbolic mother who has just given birth to them. This rite “materializes the initiatic axiom: Senoufo men reproduce themselves by incest” (Zempleni, 1990)[1].

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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] Zempleni, A. (1990) How do societies and “corporate” groups delimit themselves? A puzzle common to social and medical anthropology, Cult Med Psychia 14,2:201-11