Taboo and genetics : $b A study of the biological, sociological and psychological foundation of the familyKnight, Melvin M. (Melvin Moses)
Science
Taboo and genetics : $b A study of the biological, sociological and psychological foundation of the family
Knight, Melvin M. (Melvin Moses)
Sex (Biology); Sex (Psychology); Taboo; Women
There are certain psychological and physiological reasons for the
persistence of this dualistic attitude in the very nature of the sex act
itself. Until the climax of the sexual erethism, woman is for man the
acme of supreme desire; but with detumescence the emotions tend to
swing to the opposite pole, and excitement and longing are forgotten in
the mood of repugnance and exhaustion. This tendency would be very much
emphasized in those primitive tribes where the _corroboree_ with its
unlimited indulgence was common, and also among the ancients with their
orgiastic festivals. In the revulsion of feeling following these orgies
woman would be blamed for man's own folly. In this physiological swing
from desire to satiety, the apparent cause of man's weakness would be
looked upon as the source of the evil--a thing unclean. There would be
none of the ethical and altruistic element of modern "love" to protect
her. Students agree that these elements in the modern sentiment have
been evolved, "not from the sexual instinct, but from the companionship
of the battlefield."[56] It is therefore probable that in this
physiological result of uncontrolled sex passion we shall find the
source of the dualism of the attitude toward sex and womanhood present
in taboo.
BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR CHAPTER I
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4. Frazer, J.G. The Golden Bough: Part I, The Magic Art and the
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5. First published in Anthropological Essays presented to E.B. Tylor in
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11. Greiger, Ostiranische Kultur. Erlangen, 1882. Quoted from Folkways
[6], p. 513.
12. Robertson Smith, W. Religion of the Semites. 508 pp. A. & C. Black.
Edinburgh, 1894.
13. Thompson, R.C. Semitic Magic. 286 pp. Luzac & Co. London, 1908.
14. Ellis, A.B. Tshi-speaking Peoples of the Gold Coast of West Africa.
343 pp. Chapman & Hall. London, 1887.
15. Powers, Stephen. Tribes of California. Contributions to North
American Ethnology, Third Volume. Washington, 1877.
16. Morice, Rev. Father A.G. The Canadian Dénés. Annual Archeological
Report, 1905. Toronto, 1906. Quoted from Frazer, Taboo and the Perils of
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Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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