III.

Puberty

In many societies, puberty rites are elaborate and prolonged, especially where girls and boys are initiated into adulthood collectively rather than singly. Puberty rites mark the point at which a child takes on the role of the adult. For a girl, this might occur at the time of first menstruation; for boys, the timing varies. In some societies initiates are removed from their families and undergo a lengthy seclusion during which they might be subjected to intense physical ordeals. A variant of such practices was the vision quest of some Native Americans, in which a youth went into the wilderness alone, without food or water, in search of a personal guardian spirit, usually revealed to him in a dream.

Puberty rites generally require initiates to be instructed in the etiquette, arts, and folklore of their society, in preparation for the conditions of full adulthood. The Jewish ceremony of bar mitzvah, for a boy, or bat mitzvah for a girl, marks the passage of a young person into adulthood after a period of prescribed religious instruction.