female-female cooperation in primates. female-female competition q. lied about abuse: six years ago...

Female-female cooperation in primates

Female-female competition

Q. Lied About Abuse: Six years ago I was trapped in a disastrous marriage to an emotionally and physically abusive alcoholic. My husband threatened to kill our daughters and me if I told anyone, so I hid the abuse. Eventually a good friend discovered my secret and offered to help me escape and hide from my husband. I panicked and told many mutual friends that she tried to seduce my husband and was out to get me. My close friend eventually reported my husband to the authorities, but by accusing her of craziness my husband and I were able to duck the charges. Our mutual friends sided with me.

Later my husband and I moved away, and then I found the courage to leave him. Three years out my daughters and I are much happier. I am still haunted by my behavior towards my friend, though. I want to apologize and to tell our former friends that she was right, but I'm not sure how to explain why I acted so horribly. How should I apologize?

Slate reader letter to Dear Prudence, April 2012

Gibbon

Extensive female-female cooperation and social bonds in non-human primates

Coalitions against other females (for resources and rank)Jointly confront males (where males similar size to females)Mutual baby-sittingFight females from other groups (if important resource at stake)Social bonds live longer (independent of rank)

higher rank stronger immune system

e.g. Silk et al 2010 Curr Biol

Cooperation in bonobo females (not wild chimps)


higher rank stronger immune system

Clay et al 2012 Scientific Reportsl; Furuichi 2011 Evol Anthropol

? ?

Low-rank females call more after sex with high-rank females --- advertizing status rise?

Cooperation in female hunter-gatherers


stronger immune system? ?

Potential for female-female cooperation

Hunter-gatherersNo bias for related males or females to live together more

often(i.e. supposed tendency for patrilocality is not true

usingmodern data)

Women in foraging groups every day cf. men tend to hunt alone

Australian Aborigine Women: no alliances against men.

The Australian Aborigines are considered semi-egalitarian, because there are brutal repercussions for women when they do not perform certain tasks appropriately, whereas men do not have these same consequences. If a woman does not perform her duties she may be scolded by her mother. If she continues to fail she may be beaten by her uncles, her eldest brother, her father and her husband. In theory, a wife will be taken away from her husband if he continuously mistreats her; however, there is no recorded case of this. It is also evident that women will typically come to the aide of a woman in disputes against other females, and they will come to the aide of a man in disputes with other males, but

they never come to the aide of a woman in dispute with a man.

Begler, Elsie B. (1978) Sex, status, and authority in egalitarian society. American Anthropologist 80(3):571-58

Female-female alliance against… … a female?

YES… a male?

NO

Female-male alliance against… a female?

YES… a male

YES

Women’s groups in West Africa:a cooperative extreme

e.g. market women’s group, Yorubasecret societies, MendeAba women’s riot, 1929 (against taxes), IboIjaw women, Nigeria

co-wives can unite against husband

Factors supposedly allowing for associationPolygyny: gives wives some independence from husbandVirilocality and patrilineality: means women are all independent, not bound by kin-

groupEconomic independence: each woman has her own farm or garden, gets 0 from

husbandEconomic surplus: each woman can grow more than she needs market

AssociationsUp to 100 or more; wives of a patrilineal clanMeet every 12 days“Policewomen” ensure attendanceDecisions taken by ~ unanimous consensusLeis, Nancy B. (1974). Women in groups: Ijaw women’s associations. In Michelle Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere (eds)

Women, Culture and Society, pp. 223-242. Stanford University Press.

Masked Mende women represent the will of the secret society

Women’s groups in West Africa

What Ijaw associations doAdjudicate disputes among women

e.g. boundaries, verbal arguments“Uphold some controls men have over women”

e.g. woman slanders a patriline large fines imposedwoman admits being approached by a man large fine imposed

[because “adultery can woman’s children suffer”]Passing laws

e.g. forbid non-Ijaw women to sell in marketoutlaw abusive language in public

Work-groupse.g. clean up communal areas

‘Support’ other femalese.g. dance during FGM (performed during first pregnancy)

Punish wrong-doerse.g. force debtors (usually men) to pay

meet at his house and keep him ‘captive’taunt or socially exclude a recalcitrant woman

Leis, Nancy B. (1974). Women in groups: Ijaw women’s associations. In Michelle Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere (eds) Women, Culture and Society, pp. 223-242. Stanford University Press.

Women’s groups in West Africa

What Ijaw associations doAssociation of associations problems

Unanimity no longer possibleMajority rule wonMinority group split off

N.B. Unrelated, economically independent women forming associations!

Confronted men

Leis, Nancy B. (1974). Women in groups: Ijaw women’s associations. In Michelle Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere (eds) Women, Culture and Society, pp. 223-242. Stanford University Press.

Male control of women

The myth of matriarchy is used to justify male dominance over women“It is certain that if matriarchies ever existed, they do not now exist.” p. 265

BUT a myth of ancestral matriarchy is a very common belief, such as:Women formerly ruled (Yamana, Tukuna…)

“did not know how to handle power” chaos

e.g. incest; men forced to do “female” choresMen then took over

order resumedwomen need to be prevented from re-taking power ritual humiliations

gang rapemen’s secret societies

“The myth of matriarchy is but the tool used to keep woman bound to her place. To free her, we need to destroy the myth.” p. 280Logic: fear of chaos from the time of matriarchy justifies men’s suppression of women’s power

Bamberger, Joan. (1974). The myth of matriarchy: why men rule in primitive society. In Michelle Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere (eds) Women, Culture and Society, pp. 263-280. Stanford University

Press.

Yamana, Tierra del Fuego, early 20th century, © M. Gusinde

Gang rape in hunter-gatherer society: Walbiri, Northern Territory, Australia

129/3 “No women or children may casually enter the men’s country lest they intrude on secret activities; they may go there only in company when ordered to attend certain parts of the initiation ceremonies. A woman who breaks these rules is likely to be beaten and raped, even killed.”

Meggitt, M.J. (1987). Understanding Australian Aboriginal society: kinship systems or cultural categories? In Traditional Aboriginal Society: A Reader. (ed W.H. Edwards), pp.

113-137. Macmillan, Melbourne, Australia..

Gang rape in sexually permissive society (2): Mangaia, Cook Islands, South Pacific

Ages 4-5, boys and girls separate into sex-groups (forever).All heterosexual social contact is for coitus – since M and F never are together otherwise. Intermediaries carry messages with “sweet talk” e.g. ‘I want you’. No implication of love or marriage. All indulge. Spreading among partners is believed to avoid pregnancy.

Females show high libido, multiple orgasms; older women instruct boys sexually. But males are regarded as wanting sex more than females do - hence, females may need to be beaten.

No group sex - except gang rape of “stuck-up” or unattractive girlsMarshall, D.S. (1971). Sexual behavior on Mangaia. In Human Sexual Behavior: Variations in the Ethnographic

Spectrum. (eds D.S. Marshall & R.C. Suggs), pp. 103-162. Basic Books, New York.

Ethnography 1952-58

Traditional frequent war; always indigenous leadership.

Mehinaku, Upper Xingu, Brazil

Myth of ancient matriarchy - “males used to do the housework”

Bull-roarers - associated with male cults, male dominance over females

All females live in fear of gang rape (never want to expose labia to a man, even a lover)

Gregor, T. (1985) Anxious Pleasures: The Sexual Lives of an Amazonian People. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

Mehinaku, Upper Xingu, BrazilGang rape for females who see the men’s house.

But nothing very exciting in the men’s groups or houses… initiates often disappointed.

Gregor, T. (1985) Anxious Pleasures: The Sexual Lives of an Amazonian People. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

(4) Mundurucu, Amazonia, Brazil

Murphy, Y. & Murphy, R. F. 1974. Women of the Forest. New York: Columbia University Press.

Patrilineal, matrilocal. Men’s house = key institutionMale dominance, warfare, head-hunting.Savanna people, warfare stopped before 1950s when fieldwork done.Intense community feeling.

Men fear womenJoke about vagina dentataTalk of time when women were dominantUse secret-society to enforce male

dominance

Women work in gardens together to avoid being seen as sexually availableLone women subject to rape or gang-rape

Women gang-raped if see magic trumpets

Intergroup hostility - gang rape in ‘war’.

e.g. Mormons

October 30, 1838. Haun’s Mill massacre.

200 militiamen kill 17 Mormon man and boys. Mormon army surrenders to overwhelming force. Joseph Smith and other leaders imprisoned.

Escapers shot, women and girls raped (including gang-raped).

After 6 days General Clark tells the Mormons: “You must not think of staying here another season, or of putting in crops, for the moment you do this, the citizens will be upon you... You have always been the aggressors – you have brought upon yourselves these difficulties by being disaffected and not being subject to rule – and my advice is, that you become as other citizens”

Brodie, Fawn M. (1971) No Man Knows My History: The Life Of Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet.

New York: Vintage Books.

C. Gang rape in war (1).

New Guinea

Women captured in warfare liable to be gang-raped before becoming a wife of a warrior.

Gang rape in war (2).

Men also victims of male coercion

Bloodletting from nose in Sambia, Papua New Guinea. Part of a manhood initiation rite that includes homosexual coercion.

http://artofmanliness.com/2010/02/21/male-rites-of-passage-from-around-the-world/

Manhood initiation: coercion of males by males

Circumcision and subincision in Mardujara.



Land-diving in Vanuatu. Often preceded by circumcision.



When a Spartan youth turned 18, he completed his training. To graduate and be recognized as a man in his community, the boy had to undergo a cruel rite of passage called the krypteia. The young man would be sent to the countryside with only a knife and his wits. His object? To kill as many state-owned slaves, called helots, without being detected and return to his school in one piece.



To become a man in the Satere-Mawe, a boy must stick his hand in a glove woven with bullet ants and withstand their stings for over 10 minutes without making a noise.According to the Schmidt Sting Index, the bullet ant has the most painful sting in the ant world.



Before his rite-of-passage, a Mandan boy fasted for 3 days to cleanse his body of impurities. Then, on the day of the ritual, elders of tribe would pierce the boy’s chest, shoulder, and back muscles with large wooden splints. Ropes, which extended from the roof of a hut, were then attached to the splints, and the young man was winched up into the air, his whole body weight suspended from the ropes. Despite the pain, the boy was not to cry out in pain. While hanging in the air, more splints were hammered through his arms and legs. Skulls of his dead grandfather and other ancestors were placed on the ends of the splints.



Competition among females

Female-female competition

Competition for ‘fitness’ (reproductive success) occurs in all species- but this does not have to be aggressive competition - it can be competition to be the most efficient forager etc

Competition among primatesRoutine among females – can be aggressive

e.g. gibbon female canines, used against other females

Femalegibbon

Female and male hamadryas

Female-female competition“A study of one thousand women conducted by the American Management Association found that 95 percent of the research sample felt other women had undermined them at some time in their careers”

Heim et al., 2001, pp. 8-9

Gibbon

Sex differences in cooperation and competition – resulting from evolutionary social structure?

Boy-girl differences in social playBaby boys like to look at puppet groups more than girls do (Benenson)Boys compete for longer than girls in free play (Mead 1928, Lever 1976)

If conflict, boys make up more easilyGirls & boys value groups equally: but whereas both sexes value individuals, boys

valued the identity of the group moreBoys more readily accepted into small single-sex groups than girls

Woman-man differences in social groupsBusinesses: women prefer male to female leaders – even more than men! (Eagly et

al 1992)NB women leaders are more egalitarian

Women in shared rooms split up more often than men9-11 year triads followed for a year: girls more often exclude 1 dyad

Gibbon

Esp. Joyce Benenson

MARRIAGE: A SHIFT OF FEMALE ALLEGIANCE

44 Marriage duties among the Tiwi. The only real change in relationship with marriage (normally a young woman or

girl with much older man) is that she now owes her first allegiance to her husband, not her parents. “She accompanies him, or his other wives, in hunting and collecting trips, and shares what food she obtains with them. She collects water and firewood for his fires. Her economic education continues, but her husband or his wives teach her, and not her parents.”

45 First wife is dominant, e.g. can commandeer baby-sitting duties.

Goodale, J. C. 1971. Tiwi Wives: A Study of the Women of Melville Island, North Australia. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.

Hamadryas

Each female bonded to one male

Female-female relationships not strongly cooperative

Olive baboons

Females not strongly bonded to any male (have male friends only)

Female-female relationships strongly cooperative

female-female cooperation in primates. female-female competition q. lied about abuse: six years ago...

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