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By C. Otutubikey Izugbara
Introduction
Often a man is asleep and it is awake, and many times a man is awake and it is asleep. Many times a man wants to use it, and it does not want it, many times, it wants to, and man forbids it.
- Leonardo da Vinci (On the Penis)
The above exegesis underscores the historic fascination, which surrounds the penis and its activities. Critical reviews of history and mythology indicate that the human penis has occupied an interesting place in cultural history. David Friedman's book:
A Mind of its Own: A Cultural History of the Penis [1], documents the penis as a contested organ, which has fascinated people of all ages and I hereby recommend this interesting book to anybody who has the penis or knows someone who does. As this book shows, the discursive practices surrounding the penis have depicted it as having a mind of its own and often capable of controlling its owners. Such discursive systems however divorce the penis from its socio-cultural context and conceal the processes whereby the penis and its activities connect with the production and sustenance of mainstream masculinity. Consequently, questions about the historic role of the penis in the social construction of masculinity are currently difficult to answer.
Hypothesis
In this short formulation, I summarize my new hypothesis about the origins of hegemonic masculinity. My hypothesis centralizes the penis. I posit that it was in the primitive background that the penis emerged as a culturally invested and coded significatory element and became grafted onto a semiotic category and content regarding how all those who possess it ought to behave. This hypothesis, which is fully elaborated in my forthcoming book;
Simulacral Sexuality; The Primitive Mind and the Human
Penis, suggests that masculinity is actually a referent, and thus merely simulacral; a product of
primitive construction of the form, content, and role of the penis.
In the main, I hypothesize that masculinity is a mentally created 'world' which men are expected to inhabit. Primitive mind identified the presence of the penis as the sign or symbol for including persons in this iconic world referent. This world of masculinity is thus only an extrapolation of the excision established by the logic of an equally iconic sign (the penis) onto the world of things (onto the phenomenological world of perception). It is a world seen and interpreted, first by our primitive relatives, through the sign -the penis.
The Primitive Gaze
The human penis evidently attracted the intense gaze and wonderment of the primitive mind. At the birth of a child, primitive people, like we currently do, carefully looked out for the presence or absence of the penis. The penis therefore entered primitive cultural imaginary as a powerful sign. The presence of the penis at birth helped primitive people to classify a newborn into a cultural category. Those without the penis, primitive man thought, must be the opposite of those with it. The penis or its absence in a given human body thus became a vital signifier of a certain value; and here must be where the presence or absence of this biological organ called the penis began to assume critical cultural significance and meaning.
Sociologists agree that meaning is the making of man. The primitive site of the constitutive dialectic of the meaning of masculinity was the penis. Through it, primitive people framed the meaning of being a man. The meaning of the penis was itself actualised in the identical act of which schematising its constitutive features is essentially reflective. The penis thus became descriptive of certain values upon which primitive households based the socialization of their members who happened to possess the penis. The meanings the primitive mind attached to the penis derived from primitive understandings of (1) its 'expressive activities' and (2) its 'significative functions'.
Powerful Invader
In terms of expressive activity; that is how the penis behaves, primitive mind saw the penis as a powerful staff of office, which the gods bestowed on those they liked. The unabashed, protrusive appearance of the penis combined with its tendency to get hard, bolder, and stronger on stimulation suggested to the primitive mind that the penis has power! Primitive mind also thought the penis to be a powerful invader. The invasive nature of the penis derived from primitive understanding of the meaning of penetration. The liquid (semen), which it emits during ejaculation, was also viewed as a sort of venom, which weakened women. It registered as a tool with which to demobilize, invade, and disvalue women. In this sense, the penis was, to primitive man, a weapon, a sort of ancient tool of competition between the two sexes. Primitive man actually used it to invade and keep women in their place. Primitive women, like their 'modern' counterparts, were not expected to see the penis or openly talk about it. This socially reinforced practice of hiding the penis was actually part of the primitive politics of hiding and showing a powerful instrument of intrusion.
Power of Life, Death
The primitive view of the significative functions of the penis
i.e. the major outcomes associated with penile activity and penetration centred on loss of virginity and pregnancy thereby inscribing on the penis the power of life and death.
Origins of Hegemony
Primitive articulations constituted the penis and its possessors (men) as the powerful, respect-worthy, and preferred category. Persons born with the penis became important objects of huge social and emotional investment, who quite early on, were socialized to believe that they are worth more than, and are superior to those persons who do not possess the penis. This, to me, is the origin of hegemonic masculinity; the cultural ideology which inscribes superiority, power, vigour, strength, and brutality to men. Within this schema, male dominance, genital activity, penetrative heterosexual relation, sexual aggression, and indifference to the voices and concerns of those who do not possess the penis i.e. women, emerged as ideal male qualities. Primitive penis-centred constructions continue to dominate mainstream discourses of masculinity. Male children are not only globally preferred but also continue to constitute a highly valued social category.
A New Gaze
Hegemonic masculinity is dangerous. Empirical studies point to the role of the ideology of hegemonic masculinity in the development crisis and HIV/AIDS pandemic in Sub-Saharan Africa. The ideology encourages sexual risk-taking and irresponsibility among men and prevents women from challenging men's sexual conduct and behaviour. Hegemonic masculinity is male- privileging and encourages men to rape women, beat them, and take decisions for them. It also explains why women conceal their sexual abuse and express shame about their bodies.
By depicting men's control and subordination of women as natural, this ideology makes it difficult to promote rights to choices, sexual freedom, and positive, healthy, and respectful sexuality. This ideology frustrates positive change in sexual behaviour and gender relations. To challenge the ideology of hegemonic masculinity, we need to strip the penis and divest it of its primitive value. This involves adopting a new gaze at the penis; that is seeing it differently from the way our exotic ancestors gazed at it. This new gaze at the penis will aim at divesting it of the unmerited privileges which the primitive gaze had invested in it, and repositioning it as a mere part of the human body which can, nevertheless, be positively and effectively engaged as a transitional object in intimate, responsible and respectful relationships.
References
1. Friedman, D.M. (2001) A Mind of Its Own: A Cultural History of the
Penis. New York : The Free Press.
* C. Otutubikey Izugbara lectures in the Department of Sociology & Anthropology, University of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria..
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