Rites of Passage

Now that I’ve dug into my topic a little more, I became intrigued with the use of the fattening rooms as a way to reach womanhood.

“The fattening room is at the center of a centuries- old rite of passage from maidenhood to womanhood.”

“They say that unless you have passed through this, you will not be a full- grown woman.” (Simmons)

As I pondered these quotes, I decided to use Van Gennep’s theory of rites de passage. There are three main components: 1. Rites of separation 2. Liminality 3. Rites of reaggregation. The rites of separation can certainly translate into the use of fattening rooms. The young girls are removed from their everyday lives with their families and placed in the fattening room. They have to learn to nurture and not be nurtured. They learn to cook, clean, tell stories, have proper etiquette, dance and perform for their husbands. The liminal period can be expressed when the girls are let out of the fattening rooms over a period of time and return to the outside world, but not fully. They are not young girls anymore but aren’t complete women because they haven’t married yet. As the saying goes, they are “betwixt and between.” The last stage of reaggregation can be expressed when the girls become women as they marry their husbands and perform the traditional dance, ekombi, on their wedding day. By applying something that made sense to me like Van Gennep’s theory, to something that didn’t make sense like the use of fattening rooms, I was able to connect better with my topic. You can see that the use of fattening rooms can be a vehicle to promote womanhood in a positive manner or it can be a vehicle to succumb to society’s issues of malnourishment and ideal body image.