Operation of Subincision, Warrumanga Tribe, Central Australia
Penile subincision is a form of genital modification or mutilation consisting of a urethrotomy, in which the underside of the penis is incised and the urethra slit open lengthwise, from the urethral opening (meatus) toward the base. The slit can be of varying lengths.
Subincisions can greatly affect urination, often resulting in hypospadias requiring the subincized male to sit or squat while urinating.[1] The scrotum can be pulled up against the open urethra to quasi-complete the tube and allow an approximation to normal urination, while a few subincized men carry a tube with which they can aim.[citation needed]
Cultural traditions
Start subincisionSubincisionSubincision erection
Subincision (like circumcision) is well-documented[citation needed] among the peoples of the central desert of Australia such as the Arrernte and Luritja. The indigenous people of Australia who practice subincision also perform circumcision as a prerequisite.[2] The Arrernte word for subincision is arilta, and occurs as a rite of passage ritual for adolescent boys.[3] The Arrernte believe that the procedure was given to them by Mangar-kunjer-kunja, a lizard-man spirit being from the Dreamtime. Some academics theorize that a subincized penis is thought to resemble a vulva, and the bleeding is likened to menstruation.[4][1] This type of modification of the penis was also traditionally performed by the Lardil people of Mornington Island, Queensland. The young men who underwent the procedure were the only ones to learn a simple ceremonial language, Damin. In later ceremonies, repeated throughout adult life, the subincized penis would be used as a site for ritual bloodletting. According to Ken Hale, who studied Damin, no ritual initiations have been carried out in the Gulf of Carpentaria for half a century, and hence the language has also died out.[5]
Another indigenous Australian term for the custom is mika or the terrible rite.[6]
Samburu herd-boys of Kenya are said to perform subincisions on themselves (or sometimes their peers) at age seven to ten.[7] In Samoa, subincision of the foreskin, skin located along the tip of the penis, was ritually performed upon young men, as in Hawaii, where subincision of the foreskin is reported to have been performed at age six or seven.[8]
↑ M Tractenberg (1999). Male and Female Circumcision. George C. Denniston, Frederick Mansfield Hodges, Marilyn Fayre Milos (editors). Springer Science & Business Media. p.212. ISBN9780306461316.
Roheim, Gésa (1949). "The Symbolism of Subincision". The American Iago. 6 (4): 321–8. PMID15408819.
Bettelheim, Bruno (1962) Symbolic Wounds: Puberty Rites and the Envious Male. New York: Collier.
Farb, Peter (1968) Man's Rise to Civilization New York: E. P. Dutton p98-101.
Polynesia
Firth, Raymond, (1963) We the Tikopia: A Sociological Study of Kinship in Primitive Polynesia. Boston: Beacon.
Martin, John (1981) Tonga Islands: William Mariner’s Account. Tonga: Vava’u Press.
Diamond, M. (1990) Selected Cross-Generational Sexual Behavior in Traditional Hawai’i: A Sexological Ethnography, in Feierman, J. R. (Ed.) Pedophilia: Biosocial Dimensions. New York: Springer-Verlag, p422-43
Melanesia
Kempf, Wolfgang (2002). "The Politics of Incorporation: Masculinity, Spatiality and Modernity among the Ngaing of Papua New Guinea". Oceania. 73 (1): 56–78. doi:10.1002/j.1834-4461.2002.tb02806.x.
Hogbin, Ian (1970) The Island of Menstruating Men: Religion in Wogeo, New Guinea. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland
Australia
Basedow H. (1927). "Subincision and Kindred Rites of the Australian Aboriginal". The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. 57: 123–156. doi:10.2307/2843680. JSTOR2843680.
Cawte JE, Djagamara N, Barrett MG (1966). "The meaning of subincision of the urethra to aboriginal Australians". British Journal of Medical Psychology. 39 (3): 245–253. doi:10.1111/j.2044-8341.1966.tb01334.x. PMID6008217.
Morrison J. (21 January 1967). "The origins of the practices of circumcision and subincision among the Australian Aborigines". Medical Journal of Australia. 1 (3): 125–7. doi:10.5694/j.1326-5377.1967.tb21064.x. S2CID45886476.
Montagu, Ashley (1974) Coming into Being among the Australian Aborigines: The Procreative Beliefs of the Australian Aborigines. 2nd ed. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Pounder DJ (September 1983). "Ritual mutilation. Subincision of the penis among Australian Aborigines". The American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology. 4 (3): 227–9. doi:10.1097/00000433-198309000-00009. PMID6637950. S2CID45293571.
Abley, Mark. Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages.
Africa
Margetts, E.L. (1960). "Sub-incision of the urethra in the Samburu of Kenya". East African Medical Journal. 37 (2): 105–8. PMID13766670.
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