ABSTRACT
This chapter argues the focus on the classification of "raw" or "cooked," as well as the middle stage between them, is a way to build qualified "social beings" or "cultural beings", or human beings qua human beings. Human beings are classified in Chinese culture, as in many other cultures. The standards of these classifications might have the problem, though, of being one-sided or arbitrary. However, from the viewpoint of structural anthropology, any classification is better than disorder since a classification is the first step to a rational order. In China, during the pre-Qin period, there were the "capping ceremony" and "hair-pinning ceremony," the coming-of-age ceremonies for boys and girls, respectively. In the traditional Chinese family, to talk about sex was a taboo, and premarital sex was strictly forbidden. For that reason, parents subconsciously worried very much about whether everything would go well on the wedding night. Already in wedding ceremony, there are many explicit or implied indications of sexual relations.
