ABSTRACT
In inter-disciplinary forums, the expected role of a social anthropologist often seems to be to provide anecdotal challenges to the dominance of Western rationality. In the case of initiands, such as Asemo, the physical harm consequent on the rites performed at the riverside is less important than the social harm of not becoming a man. Physical pain is frequently regarded as a vital component of the transition from child to adult, ‘transforming from one state to the other’. In various parts of the world, including some former United Kingdom colonies, corporal punishment is a persistent manifestation of authoritarian child rearing practices, in which ‘children are supposed to know’ that physical punishment ‘reflects parental care and concern’. School punishment, specifically mentioned in both the convention on the rights of the child and the African Charter, can result not only in immediate pain, but also long term harm, and is often emotional as well as physical.
