Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research

The North American Berdache [and Comments and Reply] Author(s): Charles Callender, Lee M. Kochems, Gisela Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg, Harald Beyer Broch, Judith K. Brown, Nancy Datan, Gary Granzberg, David Holmberg, Åke Hultkrantz, Sue-Ellen Jacobs, Alice B. Kehoe, Johann Knobloch, Margot Liberty, William K. Powers, Alice Schlegel, Italo Signorini, Andrew Strathern Source: Current Anthropology, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Aug. - Oct., 1983), pp. 443-470 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2742448 Accessed: 16/07/2010 16:43

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http://www.jstor.org CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY Vol. 24, No. 4, August-October 1983 (?) 1983 by The Wenner-GrenFoundation for Anthropological Research, all rightsreserved 0011-3204/83/2404-0001$2 75

The North American Berdachel

by Charles Callender and Lee M. Kochems

THE BERDACHE amongNorth American Indians may be roughly maries. The recentlarge-scale examinations, beginning with definedas a person,usually male, who was anatomicallynor- Jacobs(1968), continuedwith Forgey's(1975) analysisof ber- mal but assumed the dress,occupations, and behaviorof the daches amongthe northernPlains tribes.Katz (1976:281-334) othersex to effecta change in genderstatus. This shiftwas publisheda large collectionof ethnographicdata about ho- not complete;rather, it was a movementtoward a somewhat mosexualityin generalamong AmericanIndians, with com- intermediatestatus that combined social attributesof males mentsfrom an explicitlygay standpoint.The new perspectives and females.The terminologyfor berdaches defined them as implicitin thisrecent work become veryevident with White- a distinctgender status, designated by special terms rather than head's (1981) analysis.Broad synthesesappeared earlier among by the words"man" or "woman."Literal translationsof these European anthropologists,who usually treatedthe berdache terms often indicate its intermediatenature: halfman-half- statusas one aspect of a more widespreadpattern of institu- woman (Grinnell 1962, vol. 2:39), man-woman (Bowers tionalizedtransvestism (e.g., Baumann 1950, 1955; Bleibtrau- 1965:167),would-be woman (Powers 1977:38). Ehrenberg1970) and concentratedon phenomenaoutside North The word "berdache"is used hereas a genericterm for this America. Signorini(1972), however,focusses explicitly upon statusthroughout North America northof Mexico. The dis- berdaches. tinctionsmade by Martin and Voorhies(1975:95-100) seem Evidence fora cross-culturalexamination of the berdache unnecessary.While variationcharacterized the institution,it status is scanty,fragmentary, and oftenpoor in quality.Still includeda commoncore of traits.Although "berdache" orig- existingin a fewsocieties, more or less covertly(Fire 1972:149- inallydesignated a male, its etymologybecame irrelevantlong 50; Forgey1975:67), berdaches began to disappear soon after ago, and it is used herefor both sexes. European or Americancontrol was established.Most accounts Althoughaccounts of berdachesgo back to the 16thcentury are retrospective,based on memoryor traditionand describing (Katz 1976:285-86),broad surveysof this status have appeared phenomenano longersubject to observation.The waning of onlyin recentyears. A few Americananthropologists briefly this status was a complex process in which the hostilityof summarizedits featuresfor North America generallyor spe- Westernoutsiders who were outragedby its open displayand cificallyfor the Plains tribes(e.g., Benedict 1934:263;Linton public acceptance was only one factor,if a verypotent one. 1936:480;Lowie 1924b:245-46). The most provocativeearly However, this culturalbias stronglyskewed the gatheringof treatment,published in 1940 by Kroeber (1952:313-14), in- information.Descriptions of berdachessometimes contain much cludeda call forgeneral syntheses. It drewalmost no response. more denunciation than data (e.g., Dumont in Swanton Except fora note by Angelinoand Shedd (1955) centeringon 1911:100; Gatschet 1891:67; McCoy 1976). The extentto which definitionsof the status, anthropologists (e.g., Hoebel 1949:459; bias determinedwhat observerssaw and reportedis evident Mead 1949:129-30; 1961:1452)continued to limittheir treat- in accounts of 17th-centuryIllinois berdaches. Marquette mentto briefstatements that differedlittle from earlier sum- (1900:129),a neutralobserver, and Liette (1947:112-13),who was prejudiced,agree on littleexcept transvestism. Sometimes thebiases ofeditors or publisherscame intoplay, excising data 1 We gratefullyacknowledge the aid ofCynthia Beall, Ives Goddard, Italo Signorini,and Elisabeth Tooker,who providedinformation or (e.g., in the London editionof James 1823) or coylyswitching made suggestionsthat are incorporatedin this article. into Latin (e.g., Kroeber 1902:20; Lowie 1910:42), a formof evasionless destructivethan Catlin's (1973, vol. 2:214-15) tak- ing refugein hopelesslygarbled Sauk (Ives Goddard,personal CHARLES CALLENDER is Associate Professorof Anthropologyat communication).Indians who absorbedthe biases of thedom- Case WesternReserve University (Cleveland, Ohio 44106, U.S.A.). inantculture became reticentabout berdachesor denied their Bornin 1928,he was educatedat theUniversity of Chicago (Ph.B., 1948; M.A., 1954; Ph.D., 1958). He has taughtat the American formerexistence (cf. Gayton 1948:106;Lurie 1953). Universityin Cairo (1961-63) and the Universityof Delaware (1963- The berdachestatus is occasionallyconfused with other con- 65) and has done fieldworkamong the Fox, Sauk, Potawatomi, ditionsthat partly resembled it. These includeforcing female and Kenuz. His researchinterests are social organization,gender dressupon males who showed extremecowardice in warfare; relations,American Indians, and the Middle East. He has pub- lished Social Organization of the Central Algonkian Indians (1963) homosexuality;and hermaphroditism. and a numberof articlesabout AmericanIndians. Observerssometimes interpreted berdaches as cowardlymen upon whom transvestismwas imposed as a sign of disgrace LEE M. KOCHEMS is a Ph.D. candidate in the Departmentof Anthropologyat the Universityof Chicago. He was born in 1958 (Bradbury 1904:64-65; Powers 1877:132). This practice did and receivedhis B.A. and M.A. fromCase WesternReserve Uni- existamong some societiesin the upperMidwest. Illinoismen versityin 1980. His researchinterests are gender relations,the who desertedduring military action had to dress like women constructionof the person,and East Africanpastoralists. but could rehabilitatethemselves by demonstratingcourage The presentpaper was submittedin finalform 25 XI 82. (Bossu 1972:82). Lurie (1953:71) describesthe similarpunish-

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 443 mentof a Winnebagowarrior who had compoundedhis offense or ambiguous.One instanceeach was reportedfor the Coeur by claimingwar honorsafter his flight.Santee Dakota youths d'Alene (Ray 1932:18) and Slave (Honigmann 1946:84), but who had never joined a war partycould be forcedto wear descriptionsof both personsas trulyintersexual cloud the ex- dressesat social dances (Landes 1968:206-7; Pond 1889:245- istenceof a real berdachecategory in eitherculture. Bella Coola 46). This usage seems a more intenseform of the widespread accountsof Haida women who dressedlike men and hunted customof shaming males who werereluctant to fightby calling (McIlwraith1948, vol. 2:95-96) are not confirmedby Haida themwomen (e.g., Wallace and Hoebel 1952:273). Restricted sources.Tlingit statements combine denials that berdaches ex- to a few societies,in which berdachesalso existed,it shared istedwith an apparentassertion of their periodic reincarnation with the latteronly the featureof transvestism.Forcibly im- in a certainclan (de Laguna 1954:178).While Kardiner (1945:56- posed by humanagents, this form of cross-dressinglacked the 57, 88) said the Comanche prohibitedtransvestism, his refer- supernaturalvalidation oftenattached to berdaches, was a ence to "effeminate"men who did thework of women suggests markof disgrace,and was temporaryor potentiallysubject to that berdachesmay have existedin a covertform, as among change. The status it denotedwas thus clearlydistinct from thePima (Hill 1938),but moreinformation is neededto resolve thatof the berdache. this question. One possible instancefrom the KinugmiutEs- Its frequentequation with homosexuality, even by explicitly kimo (Ray 1975:89, 97) is inconclusive. Goddard (1978:231) gay writers(e.g., Russo 1981:218),distorts the sexual aspects cautiouslynotes indications of berdaches among the Delaware. ofberdachehood. Certain interests were oftenbelieved to fore- Boyce (1978:283) raisesthe possibility that Tuscarora men who shadow the assumptionof this status, but only one account were poor huntersand followedother occupations might have (Gayton1948:236) cites homosexual behavior. Rather than ho- been berdaches. Practiceamong the Creek is uncertain.Ro- mosexuals'becoming berdaches, many berdaches, perhaps most mans (1964:97) reportedmale homosexuality,but not ber- of them,became homosexual;but theirsexual partnerswere daches; Underhill(1953:34) describedthe latterwithout citing always nonberdaches.Evidence for homosexualactivity un- a source;and Adair's (1966:25) referenceto a woman rumored relatedto thisstatus is abundant(Devereux 1937:498-500; Forde to be a hermaphroditeis not decisive. 1931:147; Holder 1889:625; Honigmann 1954:129-30; Jones Explicitdenials thatare not contradictedby otherevidence 1907:141; Lowie 1910:223; Osgood 1958:222-23). North Amer- have been reportedfor only nine groups: Cahuila (Drucker ican homosexualitytranscended berdaches; though they were 1937:29, 49), Chimariko (Driver 1939:347, 465), Cochiti (Lange its most visible and-except fortheir spouses-its most con- 1959:15), Karok (Driver 1939:347, 465), Maidu (Voegelin sistentparticipants, their orientations could be bisexualor het- 1942:134, 228), Serrano (Drucker 1937:27), Walapai (Drucker erosexual. 1941:218; McKennon in Kroeber 1935); Wappo (Driver Berdacheswere oftenconfounded with intersexual persons. 1936:200), and Yavapai (Drucker 1941:163; Gifford 1936:296). Early observerswho called them hermaphroditessometimes Theirsignificance is uncertain;similar denials are recordedfor assumed theywere trulyintersexual (Hennepin 1903:167-68; culturesknown to have had berdaches.Driver is openlyskep- Membre 1922:131-59; Le Moyne du Morgues 1875:7-8; cf. tical about the Chimariko and Karok statements;neither Lafitau1724:52). Morfi confessed his uncertaintyon thispoint Druckernor McKennon seems satisfiedwith the Walapai de- (Newcomb 1961:74). Font (1966:105) recorded his original nials; and Druckerstresses the Cahuila and Serranoreluctance impressionthat Yuma berdacheswere intersexed and his later to discuss any sexual matters. discoveryof the error.Stevenson (1902:37) suggestedthat ob- Directevidence for the presenceor absence of the berdache serversmay have misunderstoodsuch native termsas "half- statusdoes not seem available forother groups-a statement man-halfwoman." One factor in the persistence of the necessarilyqualified by the possibilitythat we missed refer- hermaphroditelabel may have been doubt about an alterna- ences. The significanceof silenceis hard to assess. It can stem tive. Denig (1961:187-88) applied it to Crow berdacheseven fromvery diverse causes. For manyof these cultures, destroyed while pointingout that theywere definedby theirbehavior veryearly and poorlyknown in everyrespect, the absence of ratherthan theiranatomy. referencesmeans verylittle. Other culturesin this group are The sharpdistinction between berdaches and intersexesurged well known,but those who describedthem may not have asked by Angelinoand Shedd (1955:124-25) is easily drawn at the about berdaches;informants may have been reluctantto offer conceptuallevel but harderto apply when examiningthe lit- information;or the status may have been forgotten.That si- erature.Some culturesclearly separated the two statuses. Mead's lence cannotautomatically be interpretedas evidencethat the (1961:1452) account of a boy who was classed as a berdache status was absent is shown by the relativelywell-described onlyafter he was determinedto be anatomicallymale indicates Winnebago,who wouldfall into this category except for Lurie's thatthe Omaha made sucha distinction.Other cultures blurred (1953) article.Yet to assume thatit existedunless denials were theline by assigning berdaches and intersexesto thesame status recordedis equally dangerous. When specificreferences are (Ray 1932:148; Spier and Sapir 1930:220-21; Steward 1941:253; lacking,our discussion of the distribution of the berdache status 1943:338;cf. Forgey1975:2-3). The Navaho treatedthem as rests on three assumptions:First, a group whose neighbors a singlecategory but linguisticallyseparated intersexes ("real wereculturally similar and had berdachesprobably had them; nadle") fromberdaches ("those who pretendto be nadle") and thusone mayreasonably assume their probable presence among prescribedsomewhat different rules of behaviorfor them (Hill the Kickapoo, Missouri, and Yanktonai. Second, if detailed 1935). Perhapscultures that merged the two statusesgenerally accountsof a cultureby severalobservers over a periodof time separatedthem into differentsubclasses, but the evidence is are consistentlysilent, berdaches probably did notexist. Third, no longerrecoverable. While thedata preventdrawing a clear ifreferences are lackingfor a largecluster of adjacent cultures and consistentdistinction between berdaches and intersexes, that are fairlywell known, the probabilityis that berdaches mostberdaches were anatomicallynormal and were culturally were not present. defined. The berdachestatus existed over a largearea extendingfrom Californiato the MississippiValley and upper Great Lakes, withscattered occurrences beyond it (fig. 1). If probablydis- DISTRIBUTION tributedrather more widely than the maps indicate,it still seems to have been far fromuniversal. In termsof culture Scanty,fragmentary, and unsatisfactoryas most of the data areas, usingDriver's (1969) classification,berdaches were ubiq- are, theyprovide reasonably good evidencefor the berdache uitousin Californiaand the Great Basin exceptfor a fewscat- status among the 113 groupslisted in table 1. The evidence teredgroups that are poorlyknown or whosedenials, as noted, forits existenceamong another eight groups seems insufficient are notentirely convincing. With similar exceptions they char-

444 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY acterizedthe Plains and Prairies,except for the south. Their Callender and Kochems: THE BERDACHE distributionin the Southwestand the NorthwestCoast seems to have been decidedlyless pervasivethan in the fourculture tenuationand disappearancein thenorth rested on thespecific areas firstnoted. Referencesare scantiestfor the Arctic,Sub- natureof Arctic and Subarcticsubsistence economies, to which arctic,Plateau, and East. the contributionof males was too valuable to promotetheir It mightseem predictablethat the berdache status should transformation.A significantpoint, perhaps,is that the ber- fade out toward the north,among band societieswith a less daches recordedfor all Subarctic groups except the Ojibwa complexlevel of socioculturalorganization (cf. Opler 1965:111). includedfemales, who hunted,and onlyfemale berdaches are This assumptionmay be unjustified.The distributionalpattern reportedfor the Kaska and Carrier. in NorthAmerica shows littlecorrelation between this status The relativeabsence of berdaches among Plateau groupsalso and the level of social organization.Almost universal among seems predictable,perhaps deceptively so. Whateverthe rea- band societiesof the Great Basin, even in the Subarctic it sons, the extentto whichthis seems a Plateau characteristicis extendedbeyond the limitsone mightexpect. Possiblyits at- reflectedin theirconcentration among marginalgroups that

TABLE 1

NORTH AMERICAN CULTUREs RECOGNIZING THE BERDACHE STATUS

1. Achumawi (Voegelin 1942: 134-35) 40. Kansa (Dorsey 1890: 386; Say in James 79. Quapaw (St. Cosine in Kellogg 1917: 2 . Acoma (Hammond 1882: 346) 1823: 129) 360) 3. Aleuts (Bancroft 1874, vol. 1: 92; Dali 41. Karankawa (Newcomb 1961: 74) 80. Quileute (Olson 1936: 99) 1897: 402-3) 42. Kaska (Honigmann 1954: 129-30) 81. Quinault (Olson 1936: 99) 4. Arapaho (Kroeber 1902: 19-20) 43. Kato (Driver 1939: 347; Essene 1942: 82. Rogue River (Barnett 1937: 185) 5. Anikara (Holder 1889: 623) 31) 83. Salinan (Harrington 1942: 32; Mason 6. Atsugewi (Voegelin 1942: 134-35) 44. Kitanemuk (Harrington 1942: 32) 1912: 174; Hester 1978: 502) 7. Assiniboine (Lowie 1910: 42) 45. Klamath (Spier 1930: 51-53; Voegelin 84. Santa Ana Pueblo (Gifford 1940: 66, 8. Bannock (Steward 1943: 385) 1942: 134-35) 168) 9. Bella Bella (McIlwraith 1948, vol. 1: 46. Kutenai (Spier 1935: 26-27; Turney- 85. Santee Dakota (Landes 1968: 32, 57, 45-46) High 1941: 128) 66, 112-13) 10. Bella Coola (McIlwraith 1948, vol. 1: 47. Laguna (Parsons 1923: 272; 1939: 53) 86. Sauk (Catlin 1973, vol. 2: 2 14-15; 45-46) 48. Lassik (Essene 1942: 31, 65) Keating 1825: 216) 11. Blackfoot (Turney-High 1941: 128) 49. Lillooet (Teit 1906: 267) 87. Shasta (Holt 1946: 317; Voegelin 1942: 12. Caddo (Newcomb 1961: 301) 50. Lipan Apache (Gifford 1940: 66) 134-35) 13. Carrier (McIlwraith 1948, vol. 1: 45- 51. Luiseflo (Boscana 1978: 54; White 1963: 88. Shoshoneans (Steward 1941: 252-53; 46) 146-47) 1943: 338) 14. Cheyenne (Grinnell 1962, vol. 2: 39- 52. Mandan (Bowers 1950: 272, 296, 298) 89. Shoshoni (Shimkin 1947; Steward 1943: 42; Hoebel 1960: 77) 53. Maricopa (Drucker 1941: 163; Spier 271) 15. Chilula (Driver 1939: 347) 1933: 242-43) 90. Sinkaietk (Cline 1938: 137, 149) 16. Chiricahua Apache (Opler 1965: 111) 54. Mattale (Driver 1939: 347) 91. Sinkyou (Driver 1937: 347) 17. Choctaw (Bossu 1962: 169: Romans 55. Menomini (Skinner 1913: 34) 92. Siuslaw (Barnett 1937: 185) 1962: 82-83) 56. Miami (Trowbridge 1938: 68) 93. Southern Paiute (Driver 1937: 90, 129; 18. Chumash (Costanso 1910: 137; Har- 5 7. Miwok (Gifford 1926: 333) Drucker 1941: 173; Lowie 1924b: 282; rington 1942: 32) 58. Modoc (Ray 1963: 43) Stewart 1944: 405) 19. Coahuiltecans (Cabeza da Vaca in Katz 59. Mohave (Devereux 1937; Kroeber 1925: 94. Teton Dakota (Hassrick 1964: 122; 1976: 285) 478-79; Drucker 1941: 173) Mirsky 1937: 416-17) 20. Coast Salish (Barnett 1955: 149: Teit 60. Natchez (Swanton 1911: 100) 95. Thompson (Teit 1900: 321) 1900: 321) 61. Navaho (Hill 1935; Mathews 1897: 70) 96. Timucua (Le Moyne du Morgues 1878: 21. Cocopa (Drucker 1941: 163; Gifford 62. Nez Perce (Holder 1889: 623) 7-8) 1933: 294) 63. Nisenan (Beals 1933: 376) 97. Tipai (Drucker 1941: 173) 22. Costanoan (Harrington 1942: 32) 64. Northern Paiute (Gayton 1948: 174; 98. Tolowa (Driver 1939: 347; Gould 1978: 23. Crow (Denig 1961: 187-88; Holder Lowie 1924b: 283; Steward 1933: 238; 131, 134) 1889; Lowie 1935: 48, 312-13; Simms Stewart 1941: 405) 99. Tubatulabal (Driver 1937: 90; Voegelin 1903) 65. Nootka (Drucker 1951: 333) 1938: 47) 24. Eyak (Birket-Smith and de Laguna 66. Nomlaki (Goldschmidt 1951: 387) 100. Ute (Gifford 1940: 55, 136; Lowie 1938: 206) 67. Ojibwa (Coues 1897: 163-65; Kinietz 1924b: 282-83; Stewart 1940: 298) 25. Flathead (Teit 1930: 384; Turney-High 1947: 155-5 7; McKenney 1827: 314- 101. Washo (Steward 1941: 485) 1937: 85) 15) 102. Winnebago (Lurie 1953) 26. Fox (Michelson 1927: 257) 68. Omaha (Fletcher andbLaFlesche 1911: 103. Wintu (Voegelin 1942: 134) 27. Gabrieleflo (Harrington 1942: 32) 132-33; Dorsey 1890: 379) 104. Western Apache (Gifford 1940: 66, 136, 28. Gros Ventre (Holder 1889: 623) 69. Osage (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911: 168) 29. Haisla (Olson 1940: 200) 132-33) 105. Wishram (Spier and Sapir 1930: 229- 30. Hidatsa (Bowers 1965: 166-68, 323- 70. Oto (Irving 1888: 120-33; Whitman 21) 27) 1969: 50) 106. Wiyot(Driver 1937: 347; Elsasser 1978: 31. Hopi (Beaglehole and Beaglehole 1935: 71. Papago (Drucker 1941: 163; Underhill 159) 44; Fewkes 1892: 11) 1969: 186-87) 107. Yana (Sapir and Spier 1943: 275) 32. Hupa (Driver 1939: 347) 72. Patwin (Kroeber 1925: 293; 1932: 272) 108. Yankton (Dorsey 1890: 467) 33. Illinois (Liette 1947: 112-13; Mar- 73. Pawnee (Dorsey and Murie 1940: 108) 109. Yokuts (Gayton 1948: 66, 106, 236; quette 1900: 129) 74. Pima (Drucker 1941: 63; Hill 1938) Wallace 1978a: 455; 1978b: 466) 34. Ingalik (Osgood 1958: 219, 261-63) 75. Plains Cree (Mandelbaum 1940: 256- 110. Yuki (Foster 1944: 183, 186; Powers 35. Iowa (Lurie 1953: 711) 57) 1877: 132-33) 36. Ipai (Drucker 1937: 27) 76. Pomo (Gifford 1926: 333) 111. Yuma (Forde 1931: 157; Gifford 1931: 37. Juaneflo (Kroeber 1925: 647) 77. Ponca (Dorsey 1890: 3 79; Howard 1965: 56) 38. Kalekau (Essene 1942: 31, 65) 142-43) 112. Yurok (Kroeber 1925: 46) 39. Kaniagmiut (Bancroft 1874, vol. 1: 82; 78. Potawatomi (Landes 1970: 190-91, 195- 113. Zuni (Parsons 1916; Stevenson 1902: 37- Dall 1897: 402-3) 96) 38)

Vol. 24 No. 4 August-October 1983 445 adjoined otherculture areas wherethe statuswas morecom- reported for the Carrier, Kaska, and Kutenai; the uncertain mon. Haida reference mentions only women. Even more strongly In the East, berdachesare documentedfor the lower Mis- than the berdache status as a whole, its female variety tended sissippiValley among the Natchez, Caddo, Choctaw,and Qua- to concentrate in western North America, restricted to the paw; theyalso characterizedthe Timucua. Referencesfor other Subarctic, Northwest Coast, Plateau, Great Basin, California, cultures,vague and uncertainat best,seem limited to theCreek, and Southwest (fig. 2). The only exception is a single instance Delaware, and Tuscarora. The statusmight have been wide- reported for the Crow. Female berdaches tended to be more spread in the past, disappearingsoon aftercontact. It seems prevalent in less complex societies and those in which agri- improbable,however, that reports as detailedas thosefor the culture was absent or less important. Iroquois and coveringso long a timeperiod would neverhave mentionedberdaches if these had existed. Elisabeth Tooker NUMBERS (personalcommunication) interprets this silenceas indicating theirpossible absence. We agree. The berdachestatus, then, Berdaches are usually described as rare or uncommon; num- seemsto have been surprisinglyabsent, undeveloped, or very bers, if given, are few. Holder (1889:623) reported six among obscurethroughout the East exceptfor its southernfringe. the Gros Ventre, five among the Teton Dakota, four for the Anotherregion, smaller in extent,in which referencesto Flathead, two for the Nez Perce, and one for the Shoshoni. berdachesare unexpectedlyabsent centers on thesouthern Plains Kroeber (1925:66) estimated that one Yurok man in a hundred withadjacent Prairieand Southwestcultures. The Comanche, assumed this status. Except among groups limiting the status as noted,are a debatablecase, buttheir prohibition of transves- to women, female berdaches tended to be much rarer than tism,a cardinaltrait of the status,seems to indicatehostility their male counterparts. toward it. If berdacheswere actually absent, the causes are Early accounts that mention their frequency consistentlyde- obscure,particularly since theycharacterized most of the sur- scribe berdaches as more numerous. Cabeza de Vaca (Katz roundingcultures and were prominentin the northernPlains. 1976:285) reported many of them among the Coahuiltecans Anotherdistributional aspect is the limitedoccurrence of between 1528 and 1533. Le Moyne du Morgues (1875:7-8) said female berdaches, reportedfor only 30 groups: Achumawi, they were quite common among the Timucua in 1564. In 1769- Atsugewi,Bella Coola, Carrier,Cocopa, Crow, Haisla, In- 70 Costanso (1910:137) reported them present in every Chu- galik,Kaska, Klamath,Kutenai, Lillouet, Maricopa, Mohave, mash village. Henry in 1799-1800 (Coues 1897:347-48) cred- Navaho, Nootka, NorthernPaiute, Papago, Quinault,Shasta, ited the Hidatsa with many berdaches, and Maximilian Shoshoneans,Tipai, Ute, Washoe, WesternApache, Wintu, (1906:354) gave a similar account for the Crow around 1832. Wiyot,Yokuts, Yuki, and Yuma. They may also have char- In 1822 Boscana (1978:54) reported a second-hand account that acterizedthe Flathead and Haida. Male berdaches are not they were very numerous among the Yuma before a plague

E~ A.

m C) *

C) CO

. _ _

FIG. 1. Distributionof berdaches,male and female(base map from FIG. 2. Distributionof female berdaches (base map from Driver 1969). Driver 1969).

446 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY reduced their numbers. Perhaps these reports should be treated Callender and Kochems: THE BERDACHE skeptically; yet when information is available for a specific group over time the number of berdaches dwindles rapidly. complete adoption of women's clothing marking the end of the Maximilian's statement that in 1832 the Crow had many may process. Landes (1970:198-202) describes a Potawatomi ex- be compared with Holder's reporting five in 1889 (1889:622- ample. Such an assumption could reduce some of the variation 23), Simms's counting three in 1902 (1903:580-81), and Lowie's evident in the data. meeting only one (1924b:243-44). Hidatsa traditions held that A furtherconsideration bearing on the variability reported their tribe once had as many as fifteento twenty-five;Bowers's in dress is that most of the data were gathered after American (1965:166-67) informantscould remember only two in the gen- control had been imposed. Some deviations from the general eration before theirs. Grinnell (1962, vol. 2:39) said the Chey- pattern of transvestism reflect attempts by officials to stamp enne had five, later dwindling to two, with the last one dying out the institution by forcing male berdaches to dress as men in 1879. Since overall population was also decreasing, the pro- (Bowers 1965:315; Simms 1903:580). American attitudes also portion of berdaches may have remained fairly constant, up promoted native hostilitytoward transvestism.Teit's (1930:384) to a point. Some early accounts suggest, however, that ber- statement that occasionally Flathead male berdaches briefly daches had a significant social role whose importance dimin- assumed male dress to please the men illustrates this pressure. ished as other factors combined to discourage the assumption The last Winnebago berdache wore a combination of male and of this status. Bowers (1965:168) attributes their disappearance female clothing because his brothers threatened to kill him if among the Hidatsa to the disintegration of the religious system he completed the transformation (Lurie 1953:708). It seems, to which they were linked. While it seems unlikely that ber- then, a valid generalization that in traditional North American daches were ever numerous, they were probably once more societies and under ordinary circumstances a berdache usually common than later accounts indicate. cross-dressed. Yet some of the variability reported in the lit- erature was a traditional attribute of the status.

TRANSVESTISM OCCUPATIONS Male berdaches usually adopted the dress and hairstyle of women. References to their imitatingwomen's voices and using Berdaches often followed the occupations of the gender whose their forms of speech, if these differed from men's, are less dress they assumed. This was another particularly widespread common, but this may reflect gaps in reporting rather than feature of their status, one of the traits most often cited and, actual frequency. Female berdaches usually dressed as men. like transvestism, one of the most significant. A boy's interest Transvestism was one of the most widespread and significant in women's occupations and his propensityfor engaging in these features of the status, often marking the final stage of gender might be interpretedas signs that he would become a berdache transformation(cf. Lurie 1953:708). Yet it was neitheruniversal and were sometimes advanced as the causal factors promoting nor invariable. change in gender status. Parsons (1939:38) said that a Pueblo Transvestism was prohibited by the Pima, whose male ber- male who did women's work beyond a point-the point not daches imitated the speech, behavior, and postures of women specified-had to become a berdache. Similar significance was but wore men's dress (Hill 1938:339), and by the Comanche seen in a girl's interest in work assigned to men. (Kardiner 1945:56-5 7, 88), if they had berdaches. Female ber- Male berdaches are consistently described as exceptionally daches retained women's dress among the Achumawi, Atsu- skilled in women's work, often as better than women. Among gewi, Klamath, and Shasta (Spier 1930:51-53; Voegelin the Crow they had the largest and best-appointed lodges and 1942:134-35), although no compulsion was reported and the were excellent sewers and the most efficient cooks (Simms male variety in these societies cross-dressed. The Crow female 1903:581). This proficiency,noted by observers as well as in- berdache carried weapons but dressed as a woman (Denig formants,was another attributeof theirstatus (Boscana 1978:54; 1961:195-200). Grinnell's description of Cheyenne berdaches Bowers 1965:167; Devereux 1937:513-14; Hassrick 1965:123; as dressing like elderly men (1962, vol. 2:39) was probably a Hill 1935:2 75; Howard 1965:142-43; Kroeber 1952:313; Landes misunderstanding(cf. Hoebel 1960:2 7). Accounts of male Shasta 1968:112-13; 1970:195-96; Linton 1936:480; Lowie 1935:48; berdaches conflict,Voegelin (1942:134-35) describing transves- Lurie 1953:708-10; Mathews 1897:215; Mirsky 1937:416-17; tism but Holt (1946:317) denying it. Some societies permitted Parsons 1916:523; Underhill 1969:186). Accounts of their em- individual choice. While intersexual Navahos had to dress like ployment by local Whites or acculturated Indian families are women, unmarried berdaches of either sex dressed as they also evidence to this point (Holder 1889:624; Landes 1970:198- wished. Free choice is reported for male berdaches among the 202; Steward 1941:253). Admiration for their skill centered on Northern and Southern Paiute (Gayton 1948:174; Lowie crafts and housework rather than agriculture, although some 1924b:282; Stewart 1941:405), for the female variety among references note their value as gatherers. Apparently female the Wintu (Voegelin 1942:134), and for all Shoshonean ber- berdaches showed a similar pattern of excelling in male activ- daches (Steward 1941:252-53; 1943:385). ities, with hunting most often cited (Devereux 1937:515; Hon- Male berdaches sometimes assumed the dress proper to their igmann 1954:129-30). Denig (1961:195-203) described Woman anatomic sex in certain contexts. The Navaho required those Chief as at least equal to any Crow man as a hunter; signifi- who married to dress as men, whether their spouses were male cantly, she was able to support four wives. or female (Hill 1935:273, 275-76). One condition that could Further evidence that berdaches were considered exception- evoke this shift was undertaking an action defined as specifi- ally productive is the fact that households based on marriage cally male. Miami and Osage berdaches who joined a war party between a man and a male berdache were exceptionally well- intendingto fighthad to wear male clothing until they returned to-do, more prosperous than those founded on male/female (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911:133; Trowbridge 1938:68). unions (Bowers 1965:167; Devereux 1937:513-15; Stevenson Among the Western Mono some alternated by occupation, 1902:38). So were extended families that included an unmarried dressing like women when gathering but changing to men's berdache. The Navaho regarded such a family as particularly attire to hunt. Gayton's (1948:174) suggestion that this practice fortunate,since it was assured of wealth (Hill 1935:274). Even may have distinguished men who had undergone a partial berdaches who constituted single-person households seem to transformationfrom those who had completed this and always have been well-off (Hassrick 1964:121-22; Landes 1968:324; dressed like women could perhaps be extended to other societies Mirsky1937:416-17). in which a berdache assumed this status gradually, with the Several observers attributed the productivity of male ber-

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 447 daches to their greaterstrength (Boscana 1978:45; Bowers kinds of work on a regularbasis, a berdache'sability when 1965:167; Stevenson 1902:310-11; Underhill 1969:186-87). Ca- necessaryto alternateor combinethe occupationalroles as- beza da Vaca (Katz 1976:285) and Simms (1903:580-82) de- sociatedwith male and femalegenders would have increased scribedthem as unusuallystrong or robusteven by comparison his productivity. with other men. Stevenson (1902:310) called the berdache A sourceof incomelimited to male berdachesinvolved spe- Wewha the strongestperson at Zuni and perhapsthe tallest. cificduties tied to theirstatus. They performedspecial services A Potawatomiberdache was said to be tallerthan most men in a numberof cultures. Accounts seldom specify compensation (Landes 1970:200). Statementscrediting berdaches with un- forthese, but theexamples described suggest that this practice usual size or strengthare not frequentenough to provideevi- was probablywidespread. Teton berdachesreceived horses as dencefor a generaltendency. That male berdacheswere stronger paymentfor the secret names theywere asked to give children than women seems reasonable, given theirlarger body size. (Fire 1972:217). Amongthe Californiacultures in which they This may have increasedtheir productivity; but the craftsin were responsiblefor burial and mourningrituals they were which they were most oftendescribed as excellingdid not paid fortheir services (Kroeber 1925:497, 500-501). Still an- requireparticular strength, nor does thisexplanation account otherservice peculiar to theirstatus that may have required forthe huntingskill of femaleberdaches. Bowers's (1965:167) compensationwas theiruse as go-betweens,facilitated by their emphasison theirfreedom from pregnancy and childcare echoes ability to move freelybetween males and females (Mead Stevenson(1902 :37), who estimatedthat a Zuni berdachecould 1932:189). do almosttwice as much work as a woman. This advantage again seems an insufficientexplanation for excellentcrafts- manship. Anotherpossible factorin theirproductivity may WARFARE have been industry,a traitoften imputed to them(e.g., Dev- ereux1937:513-14; Stevenson 1902 :38); perhapsberdaches had Berdache status is oftendescribed as a sanctuaryfor males to tryharder. who were unable or unwillingto accept the role of warrior Perhapsthis tendencyto excel in the occupationsassigned (Benedict 1939:572; Hoebel 1949:459; Linton 1936:480; Mar- to theirstatus also reflectedbelief in the supernaturalpowers mor 1965:13;Mead 1961:1452;Mirsky 1937:416-17; Underhill oftenascribed to this. Among the Dakota such supernatural 1969:186). Hassrick (1964:121-22) cast this interpretationin beings as Double-Woman,who orderedmen to become ber- termsof what he called "sissies" and "mamma's boys" who daches, were associated with proficiencyin such activitiesas could not face the hardshipsof huntingand warfare.Fear of quillworkingand could conferthis talentupon women who warfareis sometimesadvanced as the primaryreason for as- experiencedvisions of them. Explicitly cited by Landes (1970:36- sumingthe status(Underhill 1953:54; cf. Devereux 1937:517- 37, 41) and Mirsky(1937:416-17), the associationof berdache 18). Apparentlyformulated by anthropologistsexamining the skills with supernaturalpower can probablybe extendedto TetonDakota, thisanalysis of the male berdachedoes notreally othercultures. Hassrick (1964:133) describesthe itemsmade hold up when extendedto North America generally.In our by Teton Dakota berdaches as "highlydesirable" and "emi- opinion the evidence, consideredin its entirety,casts doubt nentlymarketable." Whether these products were valued sim- uponthis traditional view as valid evenfor the northern Plains. plyfor their craftsmanship or whethertheir desirability rested No correlationis discerniblebetween the existenceof male in part on associationswith the supernatural,their exchange berdachesand theprevalence or significanceof warfare. Their providedincome and was probablyan importantfactor in the status was as characteristicof the Hopi and Zuni as of the prosperityeven of singleberdaches. northernPlains tribes,and, grantingthat the Western Pueblos Anotherimportant component of theireconomic role and a were less peacefulthan theyhave sometimesbeen described, significantelement in the prosperityoften attributed to ber- theydiffered qualitatively in thisrespect from the Teton. Very daches restedon theintermediate nature of their gender status, warlikesocieties, such as the Iroquois, could lack berdaches, allowingthem to combineactivities proper to menand to women who were at best obscureand perhapsaltogether absent in the and maximizetheir economic opportunities. Mead (1961:1452) southernPlains. characterizedthe male berdacheamong the Navaho and Teton Men who fearedwar did nothave to assumeberdache status. Dakota as "a totallyself-sufficient 'household' capable of both Informationabout this group is slight,but its existenceis in- male and femaleactivities." Voegelin (1942:134-35) credits fe- dicatedby severalsources, including Linton's (1936:480) com- male berdachesamong the Atsugewi,Shasta, and Wintuwith mentthat berdaches had higherstatus than men who failedas thisfreedom; male berdacheshad thesame latitudeamong the warriors.Further evidence is provided by the measures to Bannock (Steward 1943:385)and some NorthernPaiute (Gay- shame them,described in the firstsection of this article,su- ton 1948:174).Navaho berdachesof either sex could undertake perficiallyresembling the cross-dressing feature of the berdache men's and women'swork (Hill 1935:275).Male berdachesare status but sharplydistinguished from it in concept.Also rel- oftendescribed as hunting.While reportingthat the Navaho evanthere, we think,is Catlin'saccount of the young Mandan forbadethem this activity, Hill (1935:275)named it amongtheir men he called "dandies,"whom the warriorsdespised. What- occupations; Gifford(1940:168) reportedit for the western ever theirsexual orientationmay have been-and we doubt Navaho berdaches.The apparentcontradiction between Mir- thathis referenceto themas "gay and tinselledbucks" (1973, sky's(1937:416-17) descriptionof Teton Dakota berdachesas vol. 1:112-14) should be taken in the contemporarysense- combining household work with hunting and Hassrick's theywere obviouslynot berdaches. (1964:121)argument that their inability to competeas hunters Berdache status, usually assumed at adolescence or fore- impelledthem to adopt berdachestatus could be resolvedby shadowedearlier, was occasionallyembraced by an established assumingthat theirhunting was limitedand-if such a term warrior.Tixier (1940:234) describessuch an event among the is proper-noncompetitive;but we suspect that Hassrick as- Osage; Irving(1888:120-22) gives an Oto example. De Smet sumedthis inability from their status. Linton's (1936:480) state- (1904:1017)met such a man amongthe Crow. A similarinter- ment that among the Plains tribes the husband of a male pretationmay apply to the Osage berdachedescribed below, berdachewas tauntedfor trying to obtain a wifewho would exceptthat he continuedwarrior activity. These incidentsseem hunt and keep house indicatesthat berdache status did not to have been rare; but so were berdaches. preclude hunting.Hunting is clearly implied in Cabeza da The frequentexclusion of male berdachesfrom warfare seems Vaca's reportthat Coahuiltecan berdaches,who also did the to us best analyzed as part of a widespreadbut variable pro- work of women, used bows (Katz 1976:285). While it seems hibitionagainst theirengaging in certainactions definedas improbablethat one person could effectivelycarry on both specificallymale. Sometimesthis prohibitionwas a cultural

448 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY rule;sometimes it was individualpractice. It was neitheruni- Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE versalnor absolute.Illinois berdaches fought but were forbid- den to use bows, symbolicof maleness(Marquette 1900:129). a Crow warrior(Denig 1961:195-200),but theiractivity in the As we have seen, the Miami requiredthem to dress as males war complexwas exceptionalfor their status and differedonly whengoing to war (Trowbridge1938:68), and a similarpractice in scale fromthat of occasionalnonberdache woman warriors. may be inferredfor the Osage on the basis of the accountof a youngman who, returningas leader of a successfulraid, was supernaturallyrevealed to be a berdache and accepted this SEXUALITY status,although he continuedto act as a war leaderand in this capacitydressed as a man (Fletcherand La Flesche 1911:133). Sexual behavioris the aspect of the berdachestatus in which The Crow berdacheLowie knew had fought(1935:8). Henry the reticenceof informantsmost often combines with the pru- (Coues 1897:163-65) describeda berdachewho acted as rear deryof observersto obscureactual practiceand in whichsup- guardfor a groupof Ojibwa, fightingoff a Dakota war party positionshave been mostfrequent. Early European observers, while his companionsretreated. This was the Yellow Head, when aware that berdacheswere not intersexual,tended to whose "disgustingadvances" later outraged John Tanner assume that men who dressed and acted like women were (1956:89-91) and whom Whitehead (1981:108) cites as an ex- necessarilyhomosexual (cf. Lafitau 1724:52). That thisbelief, ample of an unsuccessfulberdache. When the leader of a Hi- reflectedin theiruse of the word "berdache,"was sometimes datsa war partythat came upon threeDakota womendecided only an assumptionis shown by Dumont's 18th-centuryac- to countcoup upon them,one "woman" revealedhimself as a count of the Natchez (Swanton 1911:100): "as among these berdacheand drove offthe warriorswith a diggingstick, his people [the Natchez], who live almost withoutreligion and threatsaided by theirleader's arrow'sfailing to penetratehis withoutlaw, libertinismis carriedto the greatestexcess, I will robe (Bowers 1965:256). It is also clear that berdachestatus not answer thatthese barbarians do not abuse this pretended did not ensuresafety from enemy attack (cf. Kurz 1937:211). chiefof the women [berdache] and make himserve their brutal In contextsoutside warfare, berdaches were capable of vi- passions."Most laterobservers continued to hold thisview, at olentbehavior contradicting naive assumptionsthat they were least implicitly.Yet ifoften accurate, the assumptionthat ber- necessarilygentle by nature (cf. Underhill 1953:54). The Yellow daches were homosexual is oversimplified.Like their other Head, whom Henry describedas troublesomewhen drunk, attributes,sexual behaviorwas variable and verycomplex. lostan eyein a fight(Coues 1897:53).Mohave berdachesmight Questioningwhether homosexuality was an integralfeature assault unfaithfulhusbands or men who ridiculedthem (Dev- of berdachestatus, Kroeber (1952:313) pointedout thatinfor- ereux1937:510-14). The berdacheWewha was imprisonedfor mants emphasizedits social aspects-transvestismand occu- a year forattacking three policemen trying to make an arrest pations-ratherthan sexual behavior. This emphasis,prominent at Zuni (Parsons 1939:65). in the literature,could reflectreluctance to offendWestern In some societies,berdaches fought. In others,although not sensibilitiesrather than indicatingthe native view. Most ac- fighting,they had significantroles in the war complex.They counts of Crow berdachesstress social behavior,yet Holder accompaniedwarriors to carrysupplies among the Natchez (1889) obtainedexplicit data about sexual practices.Mohave and Timucua (Dumont in Swanton 1911:110; Le Moyne du informantsgave Devereux (1937) detaileddescriptions of ho- Morgues1878:7-8), to herdthe horsestaken from the Spanish mosexualactivity. The Yellow Head's intentionstoward Tan- among the Karankawa (Newcomb 1961:74). Cheyennewar ner(1956:89-91) were very clear. Homosexual exploits were an partiesoften invited berdaches to accompanythem (Grinnell importantattribute of berdaches among the Santee, who claimed 1962, vol. 2:40-41); besides treatingthe wounded, theyhad thesewere too lewd to describeto Landes (1968:112-13).Not- custodyof scalps, carriedthese into camp, and ran the dance ingthis Santee contrastwith the Potawatomi emphasis on ber- thatfollowed the raiders'return. The TetonDakota consulted daches' concernwith "proper" female behavior, she interprets berdachesto divinetheir success in projectedbattles (Grinnell this as a culturaldifference (1970:198-202). While reticence 1956:237-38; Hyde 1937:147). cannot be ignoredas a factorpotentially skewing anthropol- Ratherthan a groupof males who fearedwarfare, berdaches ogists'perceptions of the native view of berdaches,it seems were closelytied to the war complexin a numberof societies possiblethat if some culturesconsidered homosexual activity and perhaps even a crucial part of it. Admittingthat direct a significantaspect of thisstatus, others did not. evidence for his argumentis lacking, Hoebel (1960:77) sug- Most descriptionsof berdache sexual behavior stress ho- geststhat the Cheyenneattributed the success of a war party mosexuality.This involvedintercourse with persons of the same to its inclusionof a berdache, whose stored-upunexpended anatomical sex, but not with other berdaches,and entailed virilitywas essentialfor this end. We do not entirelyaccept relationsranging in formfrom casual promiscuityto stable Hoebel's preciseargument, although we agreethat by rejecting marriages.Information is, as usual,unsatisfactory. Many sources the kinds of power normallyaccessible to males berdaches are silent.Most ofthem specify little more than that berdaches mightbe regardedas acquiring special and potentkinds of lived with personsof the same sex or say theynever married powerthat could affect military actions, among other activities. withoutdescribing other relationships. Even statementsabout We do thinkthat Hoebel has discernedmuch more of the actual marriageseldom note its natureor frequency.Enough data are relationshipbetween berdaches and warfarethan those who available fora fewsocieties to discernor infercertain recurring formulatedor acceptthe traditional analysis. Further evidence patterns.Promiscuity apparently characterized Santee and Te- forsuch an associationis providedby Bowers (1965:108,327), tonDakota berdaches,who were not allowed to marrymen or who pointsout that Hidatsa men became berdachesthrough even to establish relativelylong-term sexual relationships visionssent by the Holy Women,supernatural beings closely (Hassrick 1964:121-22;Landes 1968:32;Mirsky 1937:416-17). associated with warfareand aiding young warriors;and he Catlin's Sauk account (1973, vol. 2:214-15), also implying attributestheir disappearance to the end of warfareand the promiscuity,suggests that theirsexual partnerswere young collapse of the ceremonialstructure associated with it. men, perhapsnot yet married,although it seems likelya ber- Female berdachesdid not emulatemale behaviorby becom- dache's lovers also includedmarried men. We thinkthis was ingwarriors. Gifford's (1933:5) reportthat this was one oftheir one commonpattern. Both casual relationsand marriageare attributesamong the Cocopa, not confirmedby accounts of reportedfor some societies. Holder (1889:624) implies that Crow otherRiver Vuman groups,is explicitlydenied for the Mohave berdachesseldom married, but apparently it was notforbidden; (Devereux 1937:518-19).The femaleKutenai berdachefought thefemale berdache in thistribe married women. Papago ber- (Spier 1935:26-27), and Woman Chief achieved high rank as daches, who could marry,often lived alone and receivedmale

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 449 lovers(Underhill 1969:186-87). Among the Navaho theywere sexual encounterbetween two nonberdachewomen. The Ku- freeto pursueany kind of relationship, including marriage (Hill tenaifemale berdache is said to have used an artificialphallus 1935). Brittle,unstable marriagesare describedfor Mohave toconvince her wife she was actuallya man(Schaeffer 1976:294). berdaches(Devereux 1937:157) and may be inferredfor the If homosexualityis the orientationmost often described or Ojibwa (Tanner 1956:89-91). Stable unions, reportedfor the assumed forberdaches, it is not the onlyone recordedor im- Yuma (Forde 1931:157),also characterizedthe Hidatsa, whose plied. Kroeber (1952:312) suggestedthat some of them may berdachesusually married older men, childless,who had dif- have foundtransvestism-including general social behavior- ficultykeeping wives, and ifthe husband also had femalewives satisfyingin itself.Benedict (1934:263) held that the status insistedupon a separate lodge (Bowers 1965:166-68). A Hi- includedsome men who were impotentor had a weak sexual datsa berdachecould develop a completefamily by adopting drive. Both suggestionsdraw some supportfrom the ethno- children,either village orphansor war captives taken by his graphicevidence. Osgood (1958:261-62)concluded that his in- relatives,of whom he was consideredthe mother.Among the formationabout Ingalik berdachessuggested asexuality. Teit's Cheyenne(Hoebel 1960:77) and Luisefio(Boscana 1978:54), (1930:38) denial that Flathead berdaches were homosexual, berdachescould onlybe auxiliarywives. corroboratedby Turney-High's(1937:85) laterstudy, may also Althoughdirect evidence for this conclusionis scanty,we have held fortheir Nootka counterparts(Drucker 1951:331). suspect that homosexualrelations with berdacheswere gen- The Pima prohibitedhomosexuality (Hill 1938:339). None of erallyaccepted as long as theydid not obstruct"normal" mar- theseaccounts describe heterosexual behavior. Descriptions of riages or, in some cultures,take the formof these. Concern individual berdaches among the Plains Cree (Mandelbaum withpreventing any interferencewith the child-producing male/ 1940:256-5 7), Chiricahua Apache (Opler 1965:111), and Bella femaleunions necessaryto perpetuatea societywould center Coola (McIlwraith1948, vol. 1:45-46) include denials of any mostintensely upon marriageand could explainthose cultures overt sexual activity.Fletcher and La Flesche's (1911:182) that prohibitedformal unions with berdaches. Bowers's de- statementthat Omaha berdaches "must sometimesbecome scriptionof the husbands of Hidatsa berdaches,cited above, subject to gross actions" hints at homosexualitybut implies is suggestive;even when marriagewas stronglyencouraged, that only some of themengaged in this. We conclude, then, the husbands were relativefailures maritally or already had that the berdachecategory included some essentiallyasexual female wives. Moreover,the relativelyfew indicationsthat persons;perhaps certain cultures even definedthis orientation sexual relationswith berdaches drew disapproval usually focus as proper. on marriagerather than casual affairs.This emphasisseems Otheraccounts ascribe heterosexual behavior to berdaches, clear in Linton's(1936:480) accountof the ridiculedirected at eitherexclusively or as part of a generalbisexual orientation. the husbandof a Plains berdache.Devereux (1937:513-18) at- Olson (1940:288) describedthose of the Haisla as entirelyhet- tributesthe instabilityof Mohave berdachemarriages to the erosexual,male berdachesmarrying women and femaleber- derisiontheir spouses experienced;affairs with themdid not dachesmen. The sexualpartners of one male Quinaultberdache draw thisresponse. were elderlywomen (Olson 1935:99). McIlwraith(1948, vol. This analysismight also explainthe anomalouslyvehement 2:45-46) reportedthat some male Bella Bella and Bella Coola denunciationsof sexual relationswith berdaches attributed to berdachesmarried women. One male Osage berdachehad a theTeton Dakota. Mirsky(193 7:416-17), describing berdaches wife (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911:133). AlthoughNavaho as "passive" homosexualmales, reportedthat the Tetonostra- intersexeswere restrictedto male sexual partners,their ber- cized their"active" counterparts.If the latterterms designate daches were essentiallybisexual, engagingin sexual relations the sexual partnersof berdaches,their ostracism seems im- with males and females(Hill 1935:276). So were Illinois ber- probable;Forgey (1975:3-4) argues that berdachesserved the daches, whom Liette (1947:112-13) describedas homosexuals needs of "active" homosexuals.Perhaps Mirskymeant non- who also had intercoursewith women. Informants said a Crow berdachemales who were exclusivelyhomosexual and refused berdacheoccasionally had sex withwomen, although he denied to marry.Hassrick (1964:122) cites a man's warningto his son it (Holder 1889:624). Spier (1930:50-53) describeda bisexual that relationswith a berdache will draw punishmentin the femaleKlamath berdache. If theMohave accountof a woman afterlife.Since his informantsimultaneously described homo- who turnedheterosexual after her rape by the husband of a sexual intercourseas the culminatingstep in theirtransfor- woman she was courtingsounds rathertoo much like a male mation,berdaches obviously found sexual partners. Unless such fantasy,reports of her earlierearnings as a prostitutesuggest warningswere an emptyform, it seems probable that they a bisexualcapacity (Devereux 1961:416-25).One of Steward's were actuallydirected against long-termrelationships rather Shoshoneaninformants said his great-grandfatherhad been a thanintercourse or, if really addressed to youngboys, as Lame berdache(Steward 1941:253);so was the grandfatherof a Na- Deer (Fire 1972:149)seems to imply,were meant to discourage vaho berdache(Hill 1935:273). close associationswith berdaches that might lead to assuming Besides reportsof open heterosexualbehavior that was cul- the same status. turallyapproved or at least viewed neutrally,some accounts Accountsof the modes of intercoursepracticed by male ber- describe berdaches as engagingin this surreptitiously.Dis- daches in the homosexual context are very rare. Kroeber countinga Yurok suggestionthat transvestism afforded males (1902:19-20) describesanal intercourseperformed upon Ara- sexual access to women withoutrousing suspicion, Kroeber paho berdaches. Holder (1889:625) notes its practiceby the (1952:314) accepted this as an occasional possibility.Miami Crow withoutindicating whether the context was heterosexual berdachesmay have taken similaradvantage of theirstatus or homosexualand nonberdache;he insiststhat berdaches lim- (Trowbridge1938:68). Stevenson(1902:37-38) recorded a par- ited themselvesto fellationof theirpartners. Devereux (1937: allel beliefamong the Zuni. To her statementthat Zuni ber- 511-15), who creditsMohave berdacheswith both practices- daches nevermarried women she added the qualificationthat whichalso characterizedheterosexual intercourse in theircul- theyseldom had sexual relationswith them; and while dis- ture-is the main authorityon the formsof intercoursefor countingrumors that the berdache Wewha had fatheredseveral femaleberdaches. Among the Mohave these were limitedto childrenshe believedone childto be his. Tixier(1940:23) noted digitalmanipulation of thesexual partnerand to varioustech- rumorsthat an Osage berdache was the lover of the chief's niques producingvulvic contact. He denies the practice of wife. cunnilingus,to which Mohave men were extremelyaverse; Evaluatingthis scattered information about heterosexual be- while womenmight not share thisaversion, female berdaches haviorpresents special problems.Some ofit is obviouslyhear- imitatedmale behavior.Vulvic contact, perhaps common among say, of uncertainreliability. Another factor complicating an other groups, is implied by Jones's (1907:141) account of a assessmentof its significanceis uncertaintyabout the timein

450 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY an individual'slife when heterosexualbehavior occurred.A Callender and, Kochems: THE BERDACHE berdacheusually entered this status at adolescencebut could do so as an adult and aftermarriage; or, rarely,might move who likedwomen's work was reallydestined for berdachehood. fromit back intoa normalgender status. The femaleKutenai The Papago placed such a child in a brush windbreakcon- berdachehad a husband beforeher transformationand later tainingbasketry material as well as a bow and arrowand set marriagesto women(Spier 1935:26-27). Some Mohave women fireto the enclosure;choosing the basketryas he fledensured became berdachesafter experiencing difficult deliveries (Dev- his futureas a berdache(Underhill 1969:186-87). Similar tests ereux 1937:507-8). Spier (1930:51-53) describestwo Klamath involvingobjects symbolizingmale and femalework are re- menwho withdrewfrom the berdachestatus but says nothing ported for the Pima (Hill 1938:339-40), some Ute (Stewart about theirsexual activitywhile in it. Yet, even with these 1944:298),and one Shoshoneangroup (Steward 1941:253). A reservations,it seems necessaryto concludethat a numberof Klamath incidentrather similar in formoccurred in adoles- berdacheswere bisexualwhile they held thisgender status. At cence and coincidedwith a vision experience(Spier 1930:51- firstsight, indeed, the extentof theirbisexuality seems sur- 53). prising,but, here again, the intermediatenature of the status Belief in visions may also be inferredwhen not explicitly couldwell have beenexpressed sexually as itwas in occupations reported.Pawnee and Yankton berdaches (Dorsey 1890:67; and dress. Dorsey and Murie 1940:108)were influencedby the moon, a frequentsource of transformationvisions among neighboring cultures.Marquette's Illinois account (1900:129), silentabout ONTOGENY such visions,strongly implies them. Descriptionsof transformation visions, mostly obtained from Most accountsof the processesby which individualsbecame Prairieand Plains tribes,usually involve female supernaturals. berdachescenter around two themes.One view,relatively sec- The mostwidespread was the moon,reported for the Omaha, ular and matter-of-fact,describes them as enteringthis status Sauk, and Winnebago,implied for the Yanktonand Pawnee, in childhoodby showing interest in thework of the other gender and inferablefor the Iowa, Kansa, Osage, Oto, and Ponca, and by associatingwith its members.This behaviorled their whose termfor berdache, mixuga, is glossedas "instructedby parentsto dressand treatthem as berdachesand theirsocieties the moon" (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911:132). The female to acceptthem as such. The secondand morewidespread view deityassociated with Miami berdachesmay also have been the is thatthe statusrequired supernatural validation, usually in moon, given theiruse of the term"white face" forthe status the formof a vision and generallyoccurring at adolescenceor (Trowbridge1938:68). The moon, then,had a paramountrole later,resulting in a public transformationof genderstatus. in berdachevisions among the Dhegiha and ChiwereSiouans, Stillother modes of recruitment are reportedfor a fewgroups. thePawnee, and some Algonquiantribes. In Omaha accounts, Several accountsdescribe berdaches as chosen, in infancyor the most detailed, it held a burdenstrap in one hand and a veryearly childhood, and trainedfor their role. Kaska couples bow and arrow in the other;and when the dreamerreached who wanted a daughterto become a hunterdressed her as a for the bow, quickly crossed its arms and triedto forcethe boy and gave her masculinework (Honigmann1954:129-30). burdenstrap on him,sealing his statusas a berdache(Fletcher The Luisenlo,who valued berdachesas auxiliarywives for their and La Flesche 1911:132-33). chiefs,selected certain male infantsfor this purpose (Boscana Double-Woman,similarly important for Santee and Teton 1978:54).Bancroft (1874, vol. 1:82),citing Langsdorff and Sauer Dakota berdaches,was particularlyskilled in women'swork. as sources, said Kaniagmiutwomen chose theirhandsomest Womenwho had visionsof herbecame, like berdaches,expert and mostpromising sons forthis status, which provided wives in this,or, alternatively,could becomeseducers of men(Lowie for wealthymen. The most divergentaccount, Hammond's 1916:118-19; Wissler 1916:92). Like the moon among the (1882) reportthat each Pueblo feminizedone of its mostvirile Omaha, Double-Womanoffered Teton men a choice between adult males througha combinationof continuoushorseback male and female implements,the latter making them ber- ridingand incessantmasturbation, seems best interpretedas daches. Hidatsa berdachesdreamed of Village-Old-Womanor a misunderstanding,perhaps stimulated by too enthusiastica deitiesthat she created,Woman Above and the Holy Women, searchfor parallels with the Scythians. or ofa loop ofsweetgrass (Bowers 1965:166-67, 323-30). Women Statementsthat male war captives were forcedto become who dreamedof thementered the Holy Womensociety, which berdachesseem mostly an anthropologicalmyth. Extrapolating also included the berdaches. Among the Mandan, transfor- fromIroquois reports,Carr (n.d.:18-19, 33) explained ber- mationdreams came fromOld Woman Above or otherholy daches as captivesassigned to agriculturalwork. Angelino and women;later, the dreamer picked up porcupinequills or a rope Shedd (1955) based theirargument that berdaches included in the forest(Bowers 1950:2 72, 298). feminizedcaptives on the rhetoricused by Iroquois oratorsto Supernaturalelements in gendertransformation were prob- describetheir political relations with the Delaware (cf. God- ably moreimportant than the accounts emphasizing childhood dard 1978:223), interpretingthis imageryliterally and trans- interestssuggest. Reporting that Hidatsa boyswho showedany ferringit to an entirelydifferent context. Apart from flaws in signsof effeminacywere classed withgirls and broughtup as method,both hypotheses are handicappedby the complete lack such, Biddle (Jackson1962:537) completely missed this aspect of evidence for Iroquois berdaches. A Tlingit account sug- of the process. While the Hidatsa thoughtboys who showed gestingan attemptto forcehomosexual relations upon a cap- inordinateinterest in women'soccupations were more likely to tivemale did notinvolve berdache status (de Laguna 1960:155). dreamof the deitieswho orderedmales to become berdaches, The referencesin Hill's novel Hanta yo (1979) to sodomizing this behaviorwas discouraged,even forbidden;the transfor- male enemies are entirelyfictional, according to Powers mationoccurred among young men and requiredrepeated vi- (1979:825), who explains these as an inventionbased upon sions(Bowers 1965:105-6,115, 130). Omittingthe supernatural Hill's misunderstandingof Dakota. Evidence forthis method aspectsof Illinoisberdaches and describingtheir status as one of recruitmentconsists of a singleWinnebago instance, which automaticallyassigned to boysinterested in women'svocations, Lurie's (1953:710) informantsapparently regarded as excep- Liette(1947:112-13) greatlydistorted their social role. Super- tional. naturalvalidation could be rathercovert, and informantscould The distributionof the two major processesis indicatedin view the transformationprocess very differently. Like some of table 2. A few groups appear in both lists because sources hisMohave informants,Devereux (193 7:501-3) emphasized the disagree.Emphasis on childhoodbehavior may also be inferred secularview, concentrating on children'sbehavior. Yet Drucker forcultures requiring a formaltest to determinewhether a boy (1941:173) and Kroeber(1925:7-8) reportedthat dreams pre-

451 Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 ceded thisbehavior and were believedto produceit. Some of Jones 1907:315-31). The Sinkaietkcited one of these as the Devereux'sinformants described a supernaturalexperience in precedentfor their berdaches (Cline 1938:149).That mythical the formof dreamscoming to the embryoin the womb. The sanctioncould be significantseems demonstratedby the Oto, Mohave transformationcame in laterchildhood, when the fam- who describedElk as thefirst transvestite and whoseberdaches ilyof an incipientberdache secretly prepared an initiationcer- came fromthe Elk clan (Whitman1969:50). emonywhich, if accepted by the child, certifiedits status. Anotherindication that berdache status, even when de- In societieslacking visions, mythological sanctions may have scribedas attainedby entirelysecular processesthat did not substitutedfor them, although the figuresinvolved were usu- involvevision experience, still included important supernatural ally hermaphroditesrather than berdaches.The Bella Coola aspects centerson the skills typicallyassociated with it. In regardedSxints, a supernaturalhermaphrodite, as the proto- NorthAmerican cultures, exceptional ability itself usually sig- type of the berdaches,who were somehow affectedby him nifiedsupernatural power. The Navaho beliefthat theirber- (McIlwraith1948, vol. 1:45-46). The Navaho closelyassoci- daches were predestinedto be wealthy and controlwealth ated the berdache/intersexcategory with the hermaphrodite illustratesthis point. Despite Devereux'ssecular emphasis, he twinsborn to FirstMan and FirstWoman, important mythical notesthat Mohave berdaches,especially females, were excep- figureswho inventedpottery and otherartifacts associated with tionallypowerful shamans and pointsout parallelsin the pro- women (Hill 1935:273-74; Mathews 1897:70, 217; Reichard cesses leading to the two statuses(1937:516). 1950, vol. 4:140). The transvestite-hermaphroditehad a prom- The secularand supernaturalviews of theprocesses leading inentrole in Zuni mythsand ceremonies(Cushing 1896:401; to berdachehoodare inherentlyneither contradictory nor mu- Parsons1916:524-25; Stevenson1902:37) and figuresin rituals tuallyexclusive. Incipientberdaches might well have shown at Acoma (Parsons1939:540, 765) and amongthe Hopi (Titiev interestsforeshadowing their future transformation, but we 1972:153, 214-15). One Tipai culturehero was a transvestite doubtthat cultures automatically assigned such childrento the (Gifford1931:12, 56). Transvestiteepisodes involving the cul- berdachecategory. Evidence that parents might discourage this turehero as tricksterwere widespreadin NorthAmerica (e.g., prefiguringbehavior (Bowers 1965:105-6; Denig 1961:187-88;

TABLE 2

MAIN FACTORS LEADING TO BERDACHE STATUS

CHILDHOOD VISION CULTURE INTERESTS EXPERIENCE

Achumawi (Voegelin 1942: 134-35) ...... x Arapaho (Kroeber 1902: 19-20) ...... x Assiniboine (Lowie 1910: 42) ...... x Bella Bella (McIlwraith 1948, vol. 1: 45- 46) ...... X ... Bella Coola (McIlwraith 1948, vol. 1: 45- 46) ...... x ... Cocopa (Drucker 1941: 163; Gifford 1933: 294) ...... x x Crow (Denig 1961: 187-88; Simms 1903: 580-81) ...... x ... Flathead (Teit 1930: 384) ...... x Hidatsa (Jackson 1962: 531; Bowers 1965: 105-6) ...... x x Illinois (Liette 1947: 112-13) ...... x ... Ingalik (Osgood 1958: 262-63) .x...... Iowa (Lurie 1953: 711) ...... x Kansa (Say in James 1823: 129) ...... x Mandan (Bowers 1950: 272, 296) ...... x Maricopa (Drucker 1941: 163; Spier 1933: 242-43) ...... x Miami (Trowbridge 1938: 68) ...... x Mohave (Devereux 1937: 501-3; Drucker 1941: 173; Kroeber 1925: 478) ...... X X Ojibwa (Kinietz 1947: 155-56; McKenney 1827: 314-15) ...... x Omaha (Dorsey 1890: 379; Fletcher and La Flesche 1911: 132) ...... x Osage (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911: 132- 33) ...... X Oto (Irving 1888: 120-22) ...... x Ponca (Dorsey 1890: 379; Howard 1965: 142-43) ...... x x Potawatomi (Landes 1970: 190-91) ...... x Santee Dakota (Landes 1968: 57) ...... x Sauk (Keating 1825, vol. 1: 216) ...... x Teton Dakota (Hassrick 1964: 122; Powers 1977: 58-59) ...... x Ute (Stewart 1940: 298) ...... x Winnebago (Lurie 1953: 70) ...... x Yokuts (Gayton 1948: 236) .x ... Yuma (Forde 1931: 157) ...... x Zuni (Parsons 1916: 526-27) ...... X.

452 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY Simms 1903:580-88)or be reluctantto admit its implications Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE (Devereux193 7:508) suggeststhere must have been some point at which the transformationhad to be accepted and made daches "were kepthard at workat tasks reservedfor women" formal.From thispoint of view, perhaps,a visionwas equiv- (Opler 1940:147) seems a pejorative reinterpretationof this alentto thebrushwood test or theMohave initiationceremony attributeand of the standardoccupational aspect of theirsta- as an eventthat fixed a berdache'sdestiny beyond doubt. Yet tus. Such statements,resembling the Westernbias evidentin to assume that a vision simplysanctioned or validated a dis- Stephen's(1936:276) referenceto berdachesas "abominable," positionthat had already shown itself(e.g., Meyer 1977:75) seem to be a reappraisalof the status,in retrospect,under its seems an extremeoversimplification. Transformation visions influence.Lurie (1953:708) wrote on this point, "Most infor- could come unexpectedly.Omaha men sometimestried to con- mantsfelt that the berdachewas at one timea highlyhonored ceal them,unsuccessfully, or even killedthemselves to escape and respectedperson, but that the Winnebago had become theirdestiny (Dorsey 1890:379; Fletcherand La Flesche 1911: ashamed of the custom because the white people thoughtit 132-33).As notedearlier, men who had achievedwarrior status was amusingor evil." Hill (1935:274) foundthis shift occurring sometimeshad visions directingtheir transformation.Ber- among the Navaho. In traditionalIndian societies,berdaches dache-typevisions often offered the dreamera choicebetween were respected,perhaps feared, because theircondition man- alternatives,with his selectiondetermining his future;yet the ifestedpower given themby the supernatural.Perhaps stron- significanceof his choice mightbe clear only in retrospect. gestin societieswhere visions sanctioned their status, this at- Osage accountscredit the supernaturals with surprising trickery titudealso characterizedother groups such as the Navaho. and deceit (Fletcher and La Flesche 1911:133). One youth, The supernaturalpower of berdaches apparently manifested offeredhis choiceof weapons,selected a battle-axeas themost itselfin thegender-mixing attributes of their status rather than manlyof these,only to findthat near his village it became a in distinctivepublic rolesapart fromthese. They did not hold hoe. The meaningof the bow-or-burden-strapchoice offered formaloffices. Occasional suggestionsof a close association Omaha men by the moon was obvious, but dreamersdid not withchieftainship (Boscana 1978:54; Tixier 1940:34),perhaps choosethe strap;it was forcedupon themas theytried to seize mostexplicit in Marquette's(1900:12 9) reportthat Illinois coun- the bow. cils decided nothingwithout their advice, resembleearly ac- A neglectedaspect of the selectionprocess involves state- countsof transvestites from the Circum-Caribbean area (Guerra mentsthat only members of certain social groupscould become 1971:48-49,55) but are too fragmentaryto indicatea general berdaches. While all Hidatsa boys were discouraged from pattern.A few accountsnote distinctiveritual functions. Ber- showingbehavior predisposing them toward receiving visions dachesconducted burials among several California tribes (Gay- fromfemale deities, in fact berdache status was potentially ton 1948:46, 236; Kroeber 1925:497-501; Voegelin 1942:134- open notto all males, but onlyto thosewhose fathers or broth- 35) and the Timucua (Le Moyne du Morgues 1878:7-8). In ers owned ceremonialrights to bundles associated with these Zuni ceremonies they took the role of the transvestite/ (Bowers 1965:168). Mandan practice was similar (Bowers hermaphrodite(Parsons 1916:325; Stevenson 1902:37-38). Some 1950:502).One ofDevereux's informants claimed that generally culturesassigned them ritual duties as partof the war complex onlymembers of prominent Mohave familiescould acquire the (Grinnell 1962, vol. 2:37-38; Underhill 1969:186-87). Most re- status(1937:502). If the Tlingitdid have berdaches,they had portsemphasize the intensityand extentof theirritual partic- to belongto a particularclan (de Laguna 1954:178),as among ipation rather than any distinctivefeatures. Navaho male the Oto (Whitman 1969:50). Other societies may have had berdacheswere very active in ritual,but theiractivities did similarrestrictions even if thesewere not general. not differin kind fromthose of othermen (Hill 1935:275)- anotherindication of theirability to mix gender-relatedbe- havior.They werethe most active Hidatsa ritualgroup, taking SOCIAL POSITION part in everyceremony, but shared these activitieswith the postmenopausalwomen who also belongedto theHoly Women The attitudestoward berdaches reported for North American societyexcept that, being stronger, berdaches were responsible culturesvaried fromawe and reverencethrough indifference forcertain duties such as selectingand raisingthe poles forthe to scornand contempt.We attributethis diversity to declining Sun Dance (Bowers 1965:167, 326). Berdachesmight be sha- esteem,influenced by Westernviews. Some earlyaccounts (e.g., mans,although this was usuallyan individualattribute rather Le Moynedu Morgues1878:7-8) describing the status as scorned thana propertyof their gender status. Even whencharacteristic seemexplicable as expressionsof the European reactionrather ofall berdaches,as amongthe Mohave and Yurok,shamanism thanactual nativeviews. Attitudestoward berdaches may have was notlimited to them(Devereux 1937:516;Kroeber 1925:46). variedin thepast. Certainlytheir absence could be interpreted The importanceor significance of their power for the societies as evidence of hostilitytoward the status. The ambivalent to whichberdaches belonged apparently lay in beliefsthat this Mohave views reportedby Devereux (1937) could represent could extendbeyond the individualsbelonging to this status disapprovalof the claims of anatomicaltransformation made to affect others. Intimationsof this attitude in Landes's by theirberdaches, rather than contaminationby the Western (1970:195-202) discussion of the Potawatomi are somewhat outlook.With thesereservations, we hold thatstatements as- more pronouncedin Hoebel's (1960:77) analysisof Cheyenne cribinglow statusto berdachesgenerally represent shifts away beliefsand are explicitin Navaho statementsthat theirpros- fromolder and verydifferent views. perityand even theirexistence as a people depended upon Statementsthat the statuscarried high prestige use remark- berdaches(Hill 1938:274). ably similarterms for societies widely separated in space and time.Thus, theNavaho regardedberdaches as holyand sacred (Hill 1935:297),the Hidatsa as mysteriousand holy (Bowers CONCLUSIONS 1965:326-27). Lowie's descriptionof Assiniboinberdaches as wakan(1910:42) corresponds almost precisely with Marquette's The transformationof a berdache was not a completeshift assertionover two centuriesearlier that their Illinois counter- fromhis or herbiological gender to theopposite one, but rather partspassed formanitus (1900:129). Ascriptionsof low status an approximationof the latterin some of its social aspects, seem less convincing.References to themas unproductiveor effectingan intermediategender status that cut across the lazy (Birket-Smithand de Laguna 1938:206;Gifford 1940:136, boundariesbetween gender categories. A male berdache,who 138) conflictsharply with the productivityusually stressed as mightbe referredto as "she,"could be called a man (Stevenson one of theirmain attributes.A southernUte claim that ber- 1902:87) but not a woman. Usage here resembledthe current

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 453 Westernpractice of using"she" fora male performingin drag was mostexplicitly described for the Navaho, who permitted but not labellinghim a woman. In notingthis parallel we are them any form of sexual intercoursewith either sex (Hill not equatingthe two statusesand would rejecttheir identifi- 1935:276). Finally,their ritual activity, often associated with cationexcept insofar as berdachestatus could be called a per- the vision-based power on which their transformationfre- formance.The nativeview hereseems illustrated by the Zuni, quentlyrested, also dependedon theirdefinition as nonwomen. who buriedmale berdachesin women'sdress but men's trousers Hill's (1935:276)conclusion that Navaho berdaches"enjoy more on the men's side of the graveyard(Parsons 1916:528). opportunitiesfor personal and materialgratification than the Transformationwas anatomicallycircumscribed. No matter ordinaryindividual" can be extendedto otherNorth American how successfullya male berdacheimitated the social behavior cultureseven if, as he pointsout, not all berdachestook ad- of a woman, he could not become one physiologically,lacking vantage of these. Opportunitiesfor female berdaches, except herreproductive capacities, unable to menstruateor conceive. perhapsamong the Navaho, seem to have been fewer. Nor could a femaleberdache impregnate women. Indian so- A berdache thus transcendedthe boundariesof a gender cietiessharply rejected claims thatberdaches had transcended categorythat was biologicallyand culturallydefined to attain theiranatomical sex in any sense otherthan the social. The an intermediategender status biologicallythe same but cul- acceptable limitsof transformationwere representedby Hi- turallyredefined. Crossing the boundary between these gender datsa berdaches,who became mothersby adoptingchildren. categorieswas not a singleprocess or a one-directionalmove- The femaleKutenai berdache'spretense that she had physio- ment. Berdache status includeda continuingcrossing of this logicallybecome a male was exposedby herbrother (Schaeffer boundary,in bothdirections, to such an extentthat we prefer 1976:296). to characterizethe statusas gendermixing rather than gender The Mohave openlyridiculed their male berdachesfor in- crossing.Like the opportunitiesopen to those who adopted sistingthat femaleterms be used fortheir sexual organsand thisstatus, these gender-mixing features seem muchmore pro- fortheir simulations of menstruation,pregnancy, and child- nouncedamong male berdaches.Among the Navaho, at least, birthand tauntedfemale berdaches for lacking penises (Dev- theyalso sharplydistinguished the status of berdachesfrom ereux 1937:510-13). The only possible exceptionto limiting thatof intersexes,who were not allowed to crossback. transformationwas theapparent belief among the Mohave and In examiningthe berdachestatus and its attributeswe have otherRiver Yuman culturesthat female berdaches did not not directlyaddressed the reasonsfor its existence.This issue menstruateor did so only sporadically.Yet assumingat least involvestwo closely interwoven problems: why persons became a partiallack ofthe female reproductive process, while perhaps berdachesand why NorthAmerican cultures gave thismixed facilitatingtheir practice as shamans, did not definethem as genderstatus formal recognition. Most explanationsoffered by men. A Mohave man who had intercoursewith a pregnant Americananthropologists cluster around two hypotheses,nei- womancould becomeher child's father and giveit membership therof themsatisfactory. in his clan. The same assertionby a female berdache who One hypothesisdescribes berdachehood as a statusinstituted acquired a pregnantwife was rejected;the child belongedto specificallyfor homosexuals. Implicitly held by thosewho class theclan of its biologicalfather (Devereux 1937:514).Her male it as a formof institutionalizedhomosexuality, this position counterpartwho claimedhe had givenbirth to a stillborninfant has also been adopted by some gay writers.It was presented had to burythe supposed corpse privately;public cremation, mostexplicitly and in greatestdetail by Devereux(1937) in his implyingacceptance of his pretense,was not permitted. studyof the Mohave. Devereux equated berdacheswith ho- Berdacheswho observedthe anatomical limits bounding their mosexuals,using the termsinterchangeably. He specifiedho- genderstatus gained acceptance and respect.Yet in another mosexualinclination as thefactor impelling Mohave individuals sense theserestrictions expanded social opportunitiesfor male to becomeberdaches. To answerthe second problem, he argued berdaches-who, as nonwomen,free of menstrualpollution, thatformal recognition of the berdachestatus had advantages enjoyedthe status advantages of women who had passed meno- forMohave society.Publicly identifying homosexuals and mak- pause and could take nonmale roles in ritual contexts-and ing theman institutiongave them a protectedstatus. At the were probablyan importantfactor in the mixingof gender same time,it forcedthem into the open and robbedhomosex- featuresin theirsocial behavior. uality of its glamor as somethingsecret and forbidden.Re- The berdachestatus allowed men to combineroles assigned quiringhomosexuals to dress like the othergender prevented to male and femalegenders, mixing aspects of these categories. theirmisrepresenting themselves to seduce and recruitunsus- Cross-dressing,perhaps their most consistently observed gen- pectingheterosexuals. It also allowed heterosexualsto satisfy der feature,was not universaland was assumed voluntarily. passing impulsestoward sexual experimentwithout jeopard- Regulationsforcing them to wear men'sclothing for specifically izing theirnormal status. Anyone who had sexual relations male activitiesare a significantindication of theirpotential with a berdache was only a temporarybisexual, apparently abilityto cross and recrossthe social boundariesbetween the even someonewho spentmost of his lifehaving sex withber- two main gendercategories. The occupationsassociated with daches. These practices, according to Devereux, promoted berdache status, perhaps its most importantattribute, also overallsocial healthby localizingthe homosexual"disorder." crosscutthese boundaries. They permitteda combinationof This hypothesis,in all its forms,embodies an archaic view male and femalework which,given theirfreedom from child ofhomosexuality as equivalentto defectivegender and defines care, let them achieve exceptionalproductivity. This gender it in termsof transvestismand occupationrather than sexual mixingmay have given them creditfor supernaturalpower activity.The homosexualbent that Devereux ascribed to in- thattranslated into theiroutstanding craft skills. Certainlyit cipientmale berdachesmanifested itself as intenseinterest in facilitatedtheir role as go-betweens,which rested on theirfree- women'sactivities, not as the homosexualbehavior occasion- dom to minglewith both sexes. A potentialfor gender mixing allycharacterizing other Mohave boys.Throughout their range, in activitiesrelating to warfareis not surprising.Individual berdacheshad intercourseonly with nonberdaches.Nonber- nonberdachewomen oftencrossed genderboundaries in this dache males could have intercoursewith women, with ber- area. The roleof male berdachesin thewar complexsometimes daches, and witheach other.Sexual partnersfor nonberdache approximatedthat of male or femalewarriors but sometimes women similarlyincluded men, female berdaches, and one resembledthat of noncombatantwomen withoutbeing iden- another.Perhaps only berdaches,free of pressuresto marry ticalto it. Their sexual behavioragain mixedaspects of gender heterosexually,could be exclusivelyand permanentlyhomo- categoriesand in a sense transcendedtheir limits. Conven- sexual,but theirstatus did notpreclude heterosexual behavior. tionallytaking the role of women in intercoursewith men, Our position,stated earlier,is that homosexualitywas a sec- manyalso had sex withwomen. Their privilegedsexual status ondaryphenomenon following from assuming berdache status

454 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY ratherthan precipitatingthis decision.We agree withWhite- Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE head (1981:97) thatNorth American Indian definitionsof gen- der generallyreversed the criteriaused in Westernsocieties: theEuropean school of thought are scatteredthroughout Amer- they emphasized occupational pursuitsand social behavior ican Indian culturesbut seem muchless systematized.Perhaps ratherthan choice of sexual object, which in itselfwas not thiseffect reflects the fragmentary nature of the data and more sufficientto change genderstatus. researchwould uncoverfar-reaching connections. Thus, Sig- The secondhypothesis explains berdaches as menwho were norinipoints out (p. 159) how well the berdachestatus fits the unable to meet the demands of the warriorrole or strongly Earth-female/Sky-maledualism thatsuffused Omaha culture. averse to the aggressivemale role in general (e.g., Driver It also seems to us thatthe generalNorth American concepts 1969:441;Hoebel 1949:459;Linton 1936:480).A variantblam- of individual relationswith the supernaturalallowed many ing berdaches on overprotectivemothers, suggested for the personsto obtainvarious kinds of superiorqualities, of which TetonDakota by Hassrick(1964:121-22), was extendedto the the attributesof berdacheswere a veryimportant variety but northernPlains by Forgey(1975:12) and attributedto theMo- notnecessarily superior to otherkinds. The statuswas usually have in a novel by McNichols (1944:170-71). Proponentsof separatedfrom shamanism or froma priesthood,where this these argumentsapparently share the implicitassumption- existed, and it had very importanteconomic implications. explicitin Forgey(1975:3-4)-that North Americansocieties Nevertheless,the similaritiesbetween our views and Signori- recognizedtwo sharplydistinct gender categories, male and ni's seem verystrong, including his emphasis(p. 160) on the female,and automaticallyassigned to thefemale category those abilityof berdachesto move betweenmale and femaleoccu- maleswho did notshow thefeatures of social behaviordefining pationswith economicadvantage and theirfunction as talis- theirown gendercategory. Earlier we rejectedthe view that mans. men who fearedwar became berdachesas incompatiblewith Whitehead's(1981) recentand provocativereanalysis of the theevidence. Some berdachesfought; some nonberdache males berdache status differssignificantly from earlier studies and did not; nor,for that matter, did mostfemale berdaches. Ber- representsstill a fourthhypothesis. We agree with important dache status was not a completerejection of the male role; partsof her argument,including her stresson occupationand gendermixing was one ofits essential features. Formulated for prestige,and withher analysisof the criteriaused fordefining societiesthat lacked femaleberdaches, this hypothesis attempts genderin NorthAmerica. Emphasizing the social and cultural to accountfor only the male variety.Even ifinverted to explain contextof berdachehoodseems a more productiveapproach thewomen entering this status as "too aggressivefor feminine than analyses based on speculationabout individualmotiva- pursuits"(Whitehead 1981:98), we doubt that this character- tion,usually phrased in psychosexualterms that are embedded izationfits them unless one acceptshunting as a formof aggres- in Westerncultural attitudes. Certainly the statusitself must sion. We doubt the assumed dichotomybetween aggressive be understoodbefore one can comprehendthe reasons indi- malesand nonaggressivefemales. Aggressive Blackfoot women viduals adopted it. Our major disagreementswith Whitehead may have been called manly-hearted(Lewis 1941) but were centeron her specifichypotheses explaining the relativeinfre- clearlydefined as women. quencyof femaleberdaches and the social approval extended European anthropologists,on the other hand, have ap- to the male berdachestatus. proachedthe berdache status from a verydifferent perspective, Pointingout thatwhile occupational gender crossing by men as partof a muchmore widespread pattern of institutionalized led to theirtransformation into berdaches,Whitehead notes transvestismthat theyexamine as a primarilyreligious phe- (pp. 90-91) thatwomen who crossedsocial genderboundaries nomenon.Their approach oftenemphasizes its androgynous to engagein such male activitiesas huntingand warfarewere aspects'uniting such oppositionsas male and femaleand, by not definedas berdaches.She arguesthat transformation was so doing,attaining completion or "totality"and acquiringpower moredifficult for females. The biologicalcomponent of gender (Signorini1972:159-60). They also stresslinks between this had greatersignificance for women, whose reproductiveca- statusand deitieswho are themselvesbisexual or androgynous. pacityin theform of menstrual and parturientblood threatened Eliade (1965:116), referringto Siberian shamanism,suggests males,their activities, and supernaturalpower in general.She that ritualhomosexuality "is believed to be at once a sign of holds that almost all reportsof femaleberdaches come from spirituality,of commercewith gods and spirits,and a source theSouthwest, where gender crossing included "a mystiqueof of sacred power."As thisexample suggests, these analyses are anatomicalchange" (p. 92). River Yuman groups,believing oftendrawn fromother parts of the worldand applied to the thatwomen who became berdachesdid notmenstruate, there- berdache institution.Similarly, Baumann's (1950, 1955) ex- fore assumed they lacked the female reproductiveprocess. tendeddiscussion of such phenomenagenerally concentrates Withoutthe physiological factor that inhibited the assumption on areas outsideNorth America. Signorini(1972:159), coming ofberdache status by womenelsewhere, the occupational com- fromthis intellectualtradition but directlyexamining ber- ponentin definitionsof gendercould promotetheir transfor- daches,holds that the sexual ambiguityattached to theirstatus mation. drew respectbecause theywere believed to possess qualities Women'sreproductive capacity may have inhibitedthe in- superiorto those of a normalindividual or at least particular cidenceof femaleberdaches; certainly some factordid. But, if qualitiestheir societies needed fortheir own ends. rare,they occurred more widely than Whitehead assumes and Grantingthat gender mixing seems closelyrelated to sexual werenot concentrated in theSouthwest. The anatomical-change ambiguity,we would furtherconcede that a generaldisposition mystiquethat accompanied berdache status, for both sexes, to ignorethis European tradition and concentrateon individual amongRiver Yuman culturesseems to have been a local elab- psychologicalmotivations has been a major analyticalweak- orationwithout wider significance, viewed with at least partial ness in discussionsof the berdache status by Americanan- disapprovalon its home groundand stronglyrepressed else- thropologists. Yet we have some reservations about this where.We agreewith Whitehead that hunting and warringby approach. Particularly,we doubt that the European analysis womenrepresented a crossingof social genderboundaries (or, can be transferredto North America withoutdistorting the in our terms,a mixingof genderaspects) but see a significant berdache status. Some ethnographicaccounts describe ber- differencebetween these two activitiesas theyrelated to ber- daches as an essentiallysecular phenomenon.We agree with dachehood.In some cultureshunting did not redefinethe gen- Signorini(1972:156) that this secular emphasis may reflectthe derstatus of women; in others,we suspect,this activity promoted fieldworker'sinterpretation or, for that matter, informants' lack theirtransformation. Female berdachestypically hunted, but of knowledge.Yet in some culturesberdaches may have been participationin warfarewas not an attributeof theirstatus secular. Religious conceptsconsonant with those stressedby and apparentlydid not affectgender definitions for women.

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 455 Among the Mohave, where hunting was an important occu- among the Iroquois, where its status restedon controlof ag- pation for female berdaches, it was nonberdache women who riculturalproduction and thedistribution of food (Brown 1975). took part in warfare, accompanying their husbands or brothers We suspectthat an examinationof otherareas in NorthAmer- in the same manner Grinnell (1962, vol. 2:44-47) described for ica would uncoverstill other bases forwomen's position. This the Cheyenne. Women who gained honor and prestige through objection may seem minor but has significantimplications. warfare were usually not the women who became berdaches Perhaps men of the Plains and westernPrairie culturesdid when this status was open to them. Given Whitehead's em- promotethe male berdache status to assert theirsuperiority phasis on occupational prestige, could it not be argued that over women in an occupationalsphere defined as femaleand women who engaged in high-prestigemale activities like war- associated with prestige.The absence of berdaches in their fare but remained within their gender category had higher culturesuggests that Iroquois men did not use thisstrategy- status in their societies than women who became berdaches, or thatIroquois womendid notpermit it. This last suggestion, and that this difference in prestige might explain the infre- entirelyspeculative, raises an issue we consider important: quency of transformationsamong women? Could berdacheshave beensuccessful in thisoccupational sphere Examining social approval of the male berdache status, withoutthe consentand cooperationof women? Whitehead argues (pp. 101-9) that the "permissiveness"of North The literaturesuggests that women reacted favorably to male American cultures in accepting individual variations in be- berdachesand foundthem helpful. Tanner's outraged reaction havior for which supernatural sanction was claimed actually to the Yellow Head's pursuitonly amused his Ojibwa hostess, centered upon occupations that were relevant to prestige and who welcomedthe berdache,"very expert in the various em- closely associated with gender. The regular economic activities ploymentsof the women" (1956:89-9-1)and obviouslya much of women included the production of important durable goods more valuable asset to the householdthan Tanner-perhaps that figured in giftexchange and in trade. Women who made even a betterhunter. Women's approval could exceed thatof these articles and circulated or exchanged them could acquire men. When a Zuni male decided to becomea berdache,it was wealth and social prestige in their own right, particularly if the men of his lineage who were unhappy;its women were age and marital status gave them control over the services of favorablebecause he would remaina residentof theirhouse- other women. Except for male fear of female blood, the bound- hold and increaseits workforce (Stevenson 1902:31). Perhaps ary between male and female occupations was not strongly womenencouraged and promotedthe status of male berdache, "defended," and occasional crossings of this line were accept- while "defending"their side of the occupationalboundary by able. Extending Lewis's (1941) description of the wealthy and insistingthat men who crossedit had to go througha trans- powerful Piegan women called "manly-hearted" to the entire formation. northern Plains, Whitehead concludes that very successful This speculationraises our fundamentaldisagreement with women approached successful males in prestige and surpassed Whitehead'sposition that men were consideredsuperior in unsuccessful men. A boy who could not aspire to success in worthto women throughoutNorth America and that men the male occupational sphere could seek another formof success determinedcultural practices. Systems of prestigeexisted for through women's occupations. She writes (pp. 108-9): men and forwomen, with the male systemthe more visible, themore public, and themore often described. Outsiders often Stated broadly,the culturallydominant American Indian male was confrontedwith a substantialfemale elite not perceivableas simply overlookedthe female system (Brown 1975:239-40). The greater dependentsof powerfulmen. Withinsuch a context,the responseto visibilityof the male systemdoes not mean it was actually femininetransgressions into the traditional male sphere(hunting, war- dominantor alone determinedpolicy. Grinnell (1962, vol. 1:103, fare) was amazinglydispassionate: A woman who could succeed at 128), who characterizedCheyenne women as masterful,de- doingthe thingsmen did was honoredas a man would be.... What scribedthem as therulers of the camp. Black Hawk (1955:107- seemsto have been moredisturbing to the culture-whichmeans, for 8) thoughtit importantthat women of his Sauk band supported all intentsand purposes,to the men-was the possibilitythat women, his actions. withintheir own department,might be onto a good thing.It was into The male and female systemsof prestigesometimes inter- this unsettling breach that the berdache institution was meshed,with a husbandand wifeworking together to enhance hurled. . . . Throughhim, ordinarymen mightreckon that they still held the advantage thatwas anatomicallygiven and unalterable. theirjoint status. At certainpoints either gender could move intothe other'sprestige system: women by goingto war, men We agree that the individual abilities or powers acquired by doing women's work. As far as berdache status carried through the vision quest or sanctioned by more diffuse beliefs prestige,this aspect was usuallymuch stronger among its male were not entirely random and tended to emphasize skills that members.The gender-mixingactivities of male berdaches,as may broadly be called occupational. The relation of occupa- noted earlier,seem much less prominentamong the female tions to systems of prestige and to definitionsof gender in North variety.In both aspects,the femalecounterparts of male ber- America seems beyond argument. Yet these personal abilities daches were not femaleberdaches, but women who behaved were not equal any more than visions were. The ideology en- in somerespects like men without changing their gender status. veloping berdaches, seen in their frequent description as holy, Rather than interpretingthis as a restrictionimposed upon transcended a simple confirmation of their right to engage in such women by theirreproductive capacity, we view it as a high-prestigeoccupations that involved crossing gender bound- privilegeconfined to women and suggestthat it was at their aries, just as their status itself transcended gender categories. insistencethat men who enteredtheir occupational sphere had Perhaps crossing these boundaries required unusually strong to shiftto an intermediategender status, accomplished by the endowment with power; perhaps, as we hold, the primarylocus mixingof attributesof the two gendercategories within their of their holiness and power was the gender mixing that char- culture. acterized their status. Concurring with Whitehead that North American women acquired prestige in their own right and that the female elite did not derive its position from men, we do not agree that their Comments status was generally based on the production of durable prestige goods. Apparently this activity was the foundation for their by GISELA BLEIBTREu-EHRENBERG position among northern Plains cultures. The early incorpo- Greveisberger Weg 17, 5307 Wachtberg-Villip, Federal Re- ration of eastern Prairie tribes into the fur trade and the con- public of Germany.12 III 83 sequent influxof European goods crippled the native production This thoroughand informativepaper deservesa moredetailed of these items; yet a female elite persisted. It was also evident commentarythan can be writtenin two pages. ThereforeI

456 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY must confinemyself to purely critical observations, which makes Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE what follows sound rather brusque. I hope the authors will understand my problem. This is not to deny the value of their ular time does not mean that the status was not recognized or paper in general. that people would not have known how to react when they 1. A worldwide phenomenon such as that of (cultic or sec- encountered one. During my own fieldwork among the Hare ularized) costume and sex change can, of course, be profitably in 1972-73, I observed ayouth performinga role that I interpret studied as a regional one, but this should be done only if the to be in accord with that of a berdache, and I found that his aspects which transcend the regional are discussed at the same behavior was well understood by those with whom he inter- time. This the article does not do. (Not even virtuallv identical acted, though it had a situational character and was limited instances from Central and South America are included.) to an all-Indian male setting (Broch 1977). I consider it likely 2. The berdache phenomenon, basically religious, has been that this exclusiveness is a result of the modernization processes secularized under the influence of the "white man's way," and occurring within the Hare community. That the berdache in- this has occurred in differentways and-more particularly- stitutiondisappeared so rapidly fromethnographic reports may to varying degrees among the various tribes. This explains the indicate a reluctance on the part of informants to reveal their heterogeneous and often irreconcilable picture that exists at the knowledge of it, but it may also be due to the expansion of the present time. (The article tries to go the other way and deduce behavioral repertoire of the potential berdache. With modern- certain norms concerning the status and social significance of ization and Western influence, males could find gratification the berdache from present-day circumstances. The method- within new trades (as full-time handicrafters, schoolteachers, ological error of this approach becomes clear when one realizes cooks, etc.), and females were gradually let into important what nonsensical results it would produce if applied to cultures political positions on band and settlement councils. This latter which are neither primitive nor without written history.) development is not contrary to the traditional recognition of 3. There is no discussion of the ambivalence we must assume women as important members of, and as important decision exists in the psyche of the person chosen to be a transvestite. makers in, for instance, Hare society, although the openness It is precisely here, however, that there is an indication of the of their political performance is new. social (value) change in the overall social assessment of the If the berdache institutionwas indeed absent among North- berdache phenomenon which might throw light on the effects ern Athapaskans, it does not follow that this was because of of a great sexual and cultural conflict. the specific nature of Arctic and Subarctic subsistence econ- 4. The conclusion that the berdache phenomenon is generally omies. Too often the role of the male hunter of large game is friendlytowards women is not really supported by the large given exaggerated importance, while the hunting and snaring amount of evidence presented. (I am forced by lack of space of small game, activities in which women took part and which to omit examples which clearly oppose this point of view.) In were equally critical to household and band viability, are ig- any case, the occurrence of a berdache everywhere in ritual nored. Furthermore, when trapping was introduced, a male where one would expect to find a woman raises the suspicion staying at the base camp or going along but concentrating on that there has been a reduction in the social and ritual function skinning and preparing furs and food would have been a great of women in the course of a social development which began asset, especially to the best hunters. This is, incidentally, the long before the arrival of the Europeans. role taken by some old men, not regarded as berdaches, in current Hare bush adaptations.

by HARALD BEYER BROCH Ethnographic Museum, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway. 6 by JUDITH K. BROWN Iv 83 Oakland University, Rochester, Mich. 48063, U.S.A. 8 IV This article provides a long-needed summary of our accumu- 83 lated knowledge of the institutionof berdache in North Amer- Callender and Kochems have provided a valuable compendium ica as well as a systematic, well-edited presentation of major of descriptive material that will encourage further research theoretical interpretations offered by anthropologists. I fully concerning the berdache. I would like to mention one additional agree with the authors that, although homosexuality is closely instance: the berdache among the Kwakiutl (Ford 1941:129- related to berdache status, the variation is too great to permit 32). Callender and Kochems's interestingspeculation that the a direct correlation. In this context, homosexuality should be male berdache depended upon "the consent and cooperation" regarded as a secondary phenomenon following from elabo- of the women of his society receives some confirmationfrom rations of berdache roles. The authors could perhaps have paid the Kwakiutl account. more attention to the possibilities of "moving in and out of Why were female berdaches so rare? Recent research on the statuses" or what we might call situational role behavior. aversive reaction of certain game animals to the odor of men- Two issues should be stressed in reference to both past and strual blood is suggestive (March 1980, Nunley 1981, Kitahara present distributionsof the berdache status. I believe that there 1982). Since hunting was an important attribute of female ber- are indications that both male and female berdaches may have daches, perhaps recruitmentwas limited to women with amen- existed among northern Indians such as the Chipewyan, Dog- orrhea. The incompatibility of hunting with the care of babies rib, Kutchin, and Hare. Crowe (1974:72-90) offersinformation and small children (Brown 1970) may also be relevant. about Slave Woman, a strong, courageous individual and a The nonoccurrence of the berdache requires furtherinves- mediator in peace negotiations between her own and other tigation. Callender and Kochems identifyone well-documented Athapaskan tribes. She devoted a significantportion of her life, case: the Iroquois, a society notable for the separateness of the leaving her family to do so, to this effort.Among other women sexes in daily life (see Morgan 1962[185 1]). The role of the go- mentioned were a Metis woman living on the Liard River between, so typical of the berdache in other sex-segregated (described as a physically powerful person, dressed in deerskin societies (see Thayer 1980), was here taken by the older Iroquois and with a knife at her belt) and a female leader of Arctic Red women. One example is provided by Parker (1968) in his de- River Kutchins who traded at Fort Good Hope. While our scription of the cornhusking bee that traditionallyfollowed the informationfrom this ethnographic region about the existence harvest; here was one opportunity for matrons to note the of the berdache status is scanty, this may well be due either to relative industry of those eligible to marry and to arrange the interview techniques of most early ethnographers or to the matches accordingly. reluctance of the Indians to talk about such practices. The fact In many traditional societies, the woman past childbearing that no berdache was present in a particular band at a partic- was viewed as transformedinto a being very like a man (Kerns

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 457 1979). Occasionally possessing special spiritual powers, often With regard to ethnographic understanding, I would like to becoming the go-between between the world of women and have seen a fuller appraisal of previous tabulations (to which the world of men (Brown 1982), more proficientthan novices several brief allusions are made) and a clearer statement of at performingthe work of women, the matrons in some societies how this effort builds upon and improves that which went resemble the male berdache. The parallels are curious. Whereas before it. Perhaps there is improvement in definingthe principal all societies contain aging women, why did some also have attributes of the institutionand in appraising its incidence and berdaches? variations, but without adequate analysis of prior work the It is disappointing that Callender and Kochems fail to in- quality of the contribution remains too much a matter of con- dicate how Thayer's (1980) findings, which deal only with the jecture. This is doubly lamentable in that a more critical ap- berdache among the Indians of the northernPlains, fitinto the praisal of the various accounts of the berdache status (most of scheme for all of North America which they present, and how which, the authors acknowledge, are secondhand) might have both in turn are related to the hypotheses suggested for world- gone far toward allaying the skepticism that has arisen in the wide samples by Munroe, Whiting, and Hally (1969), Munroe wake of questions about the validity of another celebrated and Munroe (1977), and Munroe (1980). A synthesisof all these institution,cannibalism (Arens 1979). studies would be welcome indeed. With regard to ethnological understanding, I am not per- suaded that the authors' theory about the meaning of berdache status should be taken any more seriously than any other. They by NANCY DATAN argue that the institutionarises largely as a functionof females' Department of Psychology, West Virginia University, Mor- domination of social life and monopolization of the ability to gantown, WVa. 26506, U.S.A. 5 IV 83 adopt the other gender's role behavior without having to as- This comprehensive survey of the North American berdache sume new gender status. No cross-cultural data are marshalled status makes the reader wish that the Nacirema-that wide- to put this hypothesis in jeopardy. Rather, acceptance or re- ranging American tribe whose habits were recorded by Miner jection of it depends largely upon which side we are inclined in the American Anthropologist in 1956-had come in for a to support in a political argument about the relative power of mention. The "exotic bias" of anthropology, while it reveals male vs. female in society. Here again, a splendid opportunity the diversity of the human condition, may mask the diversity is missed. The authors-could have used their data to further within one's own tribe. I would suggest that a major contri- our understanding of the neglect by anthropologists of the bution of this survey is how much it shows us of ourselves in woman's perspective in social life and the consequences of this the mirror of tribal cultures. For example, the status of ber- neglect for theory building (Leacock 1981). But the material dache as prestigious has its parallel in Western culture in the relevant to this is presented only at the very end of the article, figure of Teiresias, the seer of Greek myth who assumed both almost as an afterthought. male and female form, declared to Zeus that of ten parts of In spite of these shortcomings, the authors' review is pro- sexual pleasure men had one and women nine, and was struck vocative, raises a number of important issues, and constitutes blind by Hera and then compensated by Zeus with second sight a useful, concise summary of a vast field of data. and great length of life (see Datan n.d. for a discussion of androgyny and the life cycle). Parallels with contemporary American customs include the relative invisibilityof the female by DAVID HOLMBERG berdache, the frequent extension of male privilege to the male AnthropologylWomen'sStudieslAsian Studies, Cornell Uni- berdache (which may be the "factor" these authors seek to versity,Ithaca, N.Y. 14853, U.S.A. 11 Iv 83 explain the inhibition of "the incidence of female berdaches"), This detailed reassessment of the evidence on the berdache and the exclusion of male berdaches fromwarfare. Gender and status is a welcome refinementof our knowledge that will direct its ambiguities have been part of Western civilization from the futureethnological effortsand reorient our reading of previous taboo in Leviticus against putting on clothing of the opposite accounts. Callender and Kochems reexpress several of White- sex to the contemporary fascination with the movie Tootsie- head's observations on berdaches and the sex-gender systems and not merely with the irony on which the plot turns (that a of North American Indians (and correct a number of overgen- male actor cross-dresses to become a female star), but with the eralizations common to the literature on berdaches) but disa- effectof the role upon the actor himself. Anthropology offers gree with her on several points. I will touch (sympathetically) the student of human behavior a chance to appreciate the range on only three. In assessing Whitehead's emphasis on the oc- of human variation, but it should not overlook the lessons to cupational correlates of berdache status, they propose that the be learned from human commonalities. sacred powers attributed to the berdache have an independent Finally, I must take issue with the authors' concluding dis- (although not unrelated) value. This is an intriguing and im- cussion of prestige and gender. They dispute Whitehead's claim portant suggestion, yet Callender and Kochems leave us dan- that men ranked above women in prestige, arguing that the gling: What were these powers? Why are "mixed-genders" male prestige system is more visible and public and thus more powerful? How do they fit into religious symbology? How do oftendescribed. It is commendable to call attention to the often they relate to the sex-gender system? Did men and women have overlooked female prestigesystem, but it is implausible to argue equal access to this role and its concomitant powers? A dis- that women may have less visible prestige but an equal claim cussion of these aspects could enrich and supplement White- on dominance, as it must also be posited that women are con- head's interpretation.Second, they allude to the possibilitythat tent with power so subtle that its effectsare difficultto detect. women's independent abilities to achieve status may be based It is far more parsimonious, though less pleasing, to concede on something more than production and control of "prestige that women have unequal access to power. goods." Here the implicit distinction between "exchange value" and "use value" of goods may be overdrawn, for food has important exchange value in feasting and prestige systems. by GARY GRANZBERG Rather, what is called for is furtherethnographic elaboration Department of Anthropology,University of Winnipeg, Win- of the place of women in Indian systems of exchange and social nipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3B 2E9. 29 III 83 organization. Third, Callender and Kochems address White- Callender and Kochems present a useful tabulation of berdache head's view that culture in North America is a male construct, material. However, because of certain weaknesses in meth- and they argue that women were as much generators of culture odology and theory,the full ethnographicand ethnological value as respondents to a given system. This is certainly possible- of their work is not realized. if we allow women creativity in the accumulation of prestige,

458 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY why not in the generation or regeneration of culture?-but Callender and Kochems: THE BERDACHE referencesto briefobservations on the Iroquois, Cheyenne, and Sauk do not constitute an alternative model of total sex-gender were never married to other men. I was unable to learn whether systems or really support their assertion. However, Callender any of these five categories was associated with homosexual and Kochems, through judicious attention to ethnography, do practices. pose problems, by demonstrating greater diversitythan is com- The occurrence of the berdache institutionamong the Wind monly recognized, for.interpretations. Overall, it appears to River Shoshoni may strengthen the interpretationof its pres- me that Whitehead, by framing her discussion in terms of ence among the Comanche, who, as we know, separated from general comparative issues in the anthropology of sex and gen- these Shoshoni just a couple of hundred years ago. As both der, and Callender and Kochems, by thoroughlyexamining the Shimkin and I have shown, the connections between the two data, have together set the stage for yet other reassessments of tribes have remained strong right up to our own time. the berdache status. Their essays should be read in tandem. Although my documentation is insufficient,it was implied Following Callender and Kochems's rigorous mapping of the by one of my Shoshoni informants that a person became a berdache status, intensive comparison between regions seems berdache through a dream or vision. This informant distin- called for. Berdaches and their absence and variations must guished between those who assumed the status of "half-women" be situated in particular sociocultural constellations and then because they wished to do so and those who were true ber- compared. Above all, the commonly neglected domains of kin- daches as a result of visionary experiences. These two processes ship and social organization require consideration. It might be correspond closely to Callender and Kochems's two versions appropriate to compare negative cases with positive ones, be- of berdache ontogeny, although only the latter seems to have ginning with the Iroquois, to whom Callender and Kochems been institutionalized among the Shoshoni. regularly allude. Attention to the absence of berdaches in what This is apparently the more usual approach to the berdache Murdock dubbed a "quasi-matriarchy" might clarify the eth- phenomenon in North America. European scholars have, as nographic and interpretive issues. Finally, as Callender and the authors emphasize, favoured a religious interpretation.This Kochems stress, the tricksterishcharacter and sacred powers may, according to my (European!) understanding, be a correct of the berdache need furtherdevel6pment. They have, how- opinion. If, with Lowie (1940:312), we consider the vision quest ever, overlooked Thayer's (1980) contribution to this aspect of a "democratized shamanism" and change of sex is a trait com- the problem. mon to both the vision quest and shamanism, then it is possible to see American berdachism as a variation of an ancient sha- manic practice. (Limits of space prohibit me from discussing 0 by AKE HULTKRANTZ the possible causes of this behaviour.) This is, of course, just Seglarvdgen 7, S-181 62 Lidingo, Sweden. 1 Iv 83 a suggestion, but it deserves furthercontemplation. It is in any Of all the papers on the American Indian berdache institution case a remarkable fact that among the Yurok all berdaches this is definitelyone of the best in that it calmly and judiciously were shamans (Kroeber 1925:46). discusses differentapproaches without advocating any partic- ular solution. Considering the fact that the article is directed to a wide anthropological readership, it would have been even by SUE-ELLEN JACOBS betterif the etymologyof the term had been illuminated. Briefly, Women Studies, University of Washington, Seattle, Wash. the word berdache or bardache was firstused by the French 98195, U.S.A. 6 Iv 83 in New France and originates from the Arabic word bardaj, This analytical synthesis of published and unpublished ac- "slave" (Marquette 1900[1674]: n. 26). counts of the berdache status provides many valuable new ways The authors prefer-at least in most cases-a cultural def- of understanding a widespread North American cultural phe- inition of berdaches and deal extensively with their interme- nomenon that has been misunderstood by Euro-Americans for diate position in society. This kind of evaluation, which is, of several hundred years. One of the problems underlying this course, correct, has recently inspired Miller (1982) to an inter- misunderstanding has been a tendency for writers to disregard pretation of berdache status in structuralterms. Miller's article, the cultural context for a trait that is widespread among so- which has appeared too recently to be discussed by Callender cieties in so culturally heterogeneous an area as North America. and Kochems, offersthe devoted structuralistmuch "thinking," Callender and Kochems have shown us that by examining the but for most of us it is probably a bit tryingto learn that "bear cultural category in contexts of occurrence (as reported in var- beliefs can be compared with those associated with the ber- ious descriptive writings) it is possible to describe the wide dache, since both of them seem to relate to the overall definition range of endogenous expressions. of humanness" (Miller 1982:2 76). "Berdache" is defined in the Random House Dictionary as The authors rightly point out that many have been called "a man who adopts the dress and social role of a woman." The berdaches who really never belonged to this group. From my Oxford English Dictionary leads from "berdache" to several own field experiences among the Wind River Shoshoni in the other terms, one of the last being "catamite . . . a boy kept 1940s and '50s, I can report that there were several groups of forunnatural purposes." Summarizing the OED, and as I noted single men who, because of their permanent abstinence from in 1968 (following Angelino and Shedd 1955), "the English sexual relations, constituted categories of their own: (1) im- word berdache comes from the French word bardash; fur- potent men who were refused by women (of such a fellow it thermore, the French derived their term from the Italian bar- was said that "he has got his mind wrong, he is nobody, not dascia, which was taken from Arabic bardaj; and the latter recognized"); (2) men who were cowards in war, who in former borrowed from the Persian word bardah: in all cases meaning days were derogatorilyclassed with women; (3) visionaries who a 'kept boy' or 'male prostitute.' " There have been several remained unmarried indefinitelyout of fear that exposure to attempts by anthropologists to reduce the confusion created bv menstruation would destroy their relations with the guardian application of the term "berdache" to a whole host of behaviors spirits;(4) men who longed to become women, lived with women that fall outside of standard categorizations of women's and (without any sexual relationship), and imitated their ways of men's behavioral norms. Now, Callender and Kochems have talking and moving; (5) berdaches (none alive during my visits given us an anthropological definition that ought to work in to the Shoshoni), who dressed like women and performed both all North American Indian cultures in which the conception male and female tasks. These latter persons, called tawasa:' of a third gender exists. I wonder if this will help untangle the ("dried-up penis"), held a respected place in society. Only men confusion one still finds in reading the older literature. Thex were berdaches among the Shoshoni. As far as I know they have managed to give us many examples of contextual defi- Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October1983 459 nitions and descriptions of and attitudes toward third genders state that berdaches "did not hold formal office,"yet they cite (in the form of mixed-gender role enactments and categorical a case in which a "female berdache" was a chief. What they conceptualizations), gender switching (e.g., transvestism) and may mean is that when berdaches held formal offices it was homosexuality. The composite picture which shows differences incidental to their gender status. Still, being responsible for between these phenomena is becoming clearer because of their funerary activities, the naming of children, and other ritual work. Unfortunately,we are still left with a post-hoc analysis duty assignments (examples they have given of roles) may well of a series of cultural categories (now to be lumped under the have conferred formal office according to tribal concepts of term "berdache") that seems to have begun "to disappear soon "office." afterEuropean or American control was established." (I qualify I am particularly impressed with Callender and Kochems's their statement with "seems to have" because there is evidence clear recognition that among many Indian peoples women's that the berdache status continues to exist in some societies, and men's systems of prestige "sometimes intermeshed" and, even though it may be "underground.") The term "berdache" further, that in some societies women's approval of certain has been applied to the aforementioned categories in the past, men's behaviors was necessary for those behaviors to be tol- but if we follow the proposed definition here it will not be so erated in the community. I agree with them in their disagree- applied to transvestism and homosexuality, and it will include ment with Whitehead's position regarding the relative worth women as well as men who are gender-mixed. of women and men. There is abundant ethnographic evidence In the list of tribes for which berdaches have been reported, that men and women used to have comparable worth in many the Tewa (Rio Grande Pueblo peoples), whom I listed in 1968, North American Indian societies. That this is not true in some have been left out, presumably because of unreliability of communities of recent years is evidence of adoption of Euro- sources. Afterten years of research into published information American values on this matter. available on the Tewa, I support this exclusion on those grounds. Although the Tewa elders with whom I have spoken would However, my ethnographic research has uncovered some in- not assign a male or female sex to quetho, I pushed the point terestinginformation. Among some Tewa of New Mexico, the furtheron a number of occasions, asking if women were ever concept of quetho continues to be acknowledged. According to quethos. The answer was no. Then I asked if men were the Tewa elders, a quetho comes into being because its genitals only ones who were quethos. Again, the answer was no. In were exposed to the full moon at a critical time during early trying to force a categorization of quethos as women or men infancy. Quethos have special qualities, identifiable when the (or female or male), I only exasperated my Tewa friends, who child is quite young: special relationships to deities or super- do make a clear distinction between quethos, homosexuals (gay natural forces; a mid-gender or androgynous personality, with men and women), women, men, and those who on ceremonial "gentle" qualities prevailing; and resistance to full adolescent occasion dress in the attire of their opposite sex. If the Tewa socialization into traditional men's or women's roles. According do this, along with others (including their neighbors the Na- to these same elders, quethos should be raised "to be who they vajo), is it not possible that we are still asking the wrong are"; such child-rearing practices ideally place the burden of questions because in Euro-American culture we have a difficult enculturation to proper third-gender(i.e., quetho) behavior and time accepting that there can be a genuinely conceptualized body of cultural knowledge on an adult quetho. Quethos are third gender that has nothing to do with transvestism or ho- designated as a third gender and are clearly distinguished from mosexuality? If I went by the verbal accountings of elders only, homosexual men and women. Homosexuals are, according to the quetho would not fit Callender and Kochems's definition informants, "mixed-up people who can be cured." The only of a berdache. Going on accounts given by others, the charac- quethos these elders have recognized are individuals who ap- terizations of quethos begin to look more like characterizations pear to be males because of dress, names, and other "normal" of contemporary gay males, particularly. My observations con- male markers. When questioned about the genitals of quethos firmthis latter. No referenceor observation indicates that que- (a hard subject to pursue because of the sense of privacy that thos or gay men publicly wear clothing of "the opposite sex," prevails on such matters in normal conversation, though it is however. In this situation, definitionsof gender emphasize not a subject of jokes in other situations), I was told that quethos only"occupational pursuits or social behavior, ratherthan choice are "like women and men in their private parts." In various of sexual objects," but also personal characteristics of the in- studies of Tewa origin stories and mythsregarding supernatural dividual. That there is conflictinginformation regarding que- beings, one finds reference to androgynous people. The pro- thos when one compares statements of elders with those of noun used most oftento referto contemporary quethos is "she." younger people is, to me, another example of local adoption Pronoun reference to animals and people who are not person- of Euro-American values. The fit of quetho to Callender and ally known to the speaker sometimes takes the form "she or Kochems's definition remains to be judged in ethnohistorical he or whatever it may be." Quethos may be bisexual, homo- and contemporary sociocultural contexts, as has been done by sexual, heterosexual, or trisexual (i.e., having sexual relation- these authors in examining other indigenously defined third ships with women, men, and quethos), and the same is true genders. for non-quethos. This of course, refers to sexual activity, not personal characteristics or role assignments. Further elabora- tion on this matter will have to be reserved for another place by ALICE B. KEHOE (Jacobs n.d.). Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Social Work, I applaud Callender and Kochems for their detailed work Marquette University,Milwaukee, Wis. 53233, U.S.A. 26 II and respect the theoretical direction their work follows. They 83 also are to be commended forproviding useful departure points At last, a thorough, sensitive, and sensible survey of the ber- for furtherresearch. A few statements in the article puzzle me, dache status, sensu stricto. I agree with Callender and Ko- however. They say that the distribution of berdaches in the chems, though I can expand somewhat on their conclusion. Southwest "seems to have been decidedly less pervasive than Speaking from the point of view of the northern Plains In- in the four culture areas first noted," but on their list they dians, it should be borne in mind that Algonkian and Siouan include the Navajo, Hopi, Zuni, Papago, Pima, and Yuma. languages, unlike the Indo-European ones, do not require the They do not list the Apache (whom Stewart listed in 1960) or specification of the sex of nouns. Sexual categorization is thus the Pueblos (whom Hay referred to in 1963). Given the dis- not subconsciously as compelling to Algonkian- or Siouan- tribution of cultures in the Southwest, the proportional occur- speakers as it is to speakers of Indo-European languages; it is rence of berdache status (as they have defined it) could have easier for Plains Indians to think of sexual categorization as a been as high in the Southwest as in other culture areas. They relatively minor attribute. The compelling gender categoriza-

460 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY tion for Algonkian-speakers is animate versus inanimate, and Callender and Kochems: THE BERDACHE because "animate" is fundamentally the presence of Power (in European scientificterminology, vitalism), the degree of Power 4. The position of berdaches could be defined more precisely inherent in a being is one of its major attributes. by noting which terms of women's speech they use and which As Callender and Kochems note, there tends to be an as- not. For instance, Roman men swore by Jupiter(mediusfidius) sociation of the moon as a female deity with berdaches. Un- and women by Castor, Jupiter's son (ecastor). published notes by the late Claude E. Schaeffer describe a Blackfoot holy man named Four Bears who died about 1889 and who was described by two of Schaeffer's informants as by MARGOT LIBERTY deriving power from the moon. To signify the source of his 1149 Pioneer Rd., Sheridan, Wyo. 82801, U.S.A. 10 Iv 83 power, Four Bears dressed as a woman when, and only when, performing as a holy person, and one of his rites included 1. Berdache status and cultural definition may be gone, but obliging young men on whom he was conferringgood luck to male transvestism in the northern Plains is not: a Northern suckle his nipple. This symbolic crossing of sexual categori- Cheyenne example dating from the 1960s has left vivid mem- zations by a nonberdache emphasizes, it seems to me, the im- ories on the reservation and in bordering non-Indian com- portance of nongenital connotations to Plains Indian sexual- munities. category symbols. 2. The economic and social value of the berdache role seems Callender and Kochems's critique of Whitehead's assump- indeed likely to have arisen in Plains cultures with the rise of tion that men were considered superior to women in Indian labor needs in producing tanned and ornamental robes and societies is well supported both in the literature, allowing for other leather goods for trade. Thus berdache frequency prob- bias in earlier works (Kehoe 1983), and in contemporaryIndian ably increased after such trade became prevalent, from an groups. As I argued in an earlier paper (Kehoe 1976), the earlier hunting baseline in which "the contribution of males Blackfoot attributespiritual blessings to the mediation of women: was too valuable to promote their transformation." only women can open medicine bundles, and the Sun Dance 3. The supernatural power widely attributed to berdaches requires a holy woman to serve as its focus. Blackfoot myths in the northernPlains may perhaps have included the transfer describe the major medicine powers (bundles) as coming to of sacred power from senior priest to novice priest through their people through the agency of women. To the Blackfoot, mutual homosexual intercourse with a berdache intermediary, men:women::nature:culture, the myth of the primeval mar- as has been reported for shared heterosexual intercourse in riages describing women enjoying a civilized home while men several northern Plains societies. were sufferinglike beasts, unable to cook or to clothe or shelter 4. The existence of any widespread "female elite" in Plains themselves. Siouan myths and rituals similarly cast women as cultures afterthe adoption of horses is doubtful. Using the four the medium through which spiritual power can flow to men criteria of (1) subsistence contribution/economic control, (2) (Kehoe 1970). Thus Plains Indian women did not need to "in- political power roles, (3) supernatural power roles, and (4) per- sist,"as Callender and Kochems phrase it, that men who wished sonal physical autonomy, I have argued that for Plains Indian to gain proficiencyand possiblv status in women's occupations women the quality of life deteriorated drastically in the classic remove themselves from the sexual category "man"; the ide- equestrian period. It is hard to agree with Grinnell that Chev- ology of the societies excluded men from the status of those enne women were generally masterful "rulers of the camp" humans who normally inherently are imbued with power to when they were widely subject to nasal amputation for alleged reproduce civilization, both its carriers and its crafts. A person marital unfaithfulness,as well as to gang rape for disobedience who has been giftedwith some of this reproductive power, that to their brothers, and prone to suicide (Hanging Woman Creek of producing a civilized home with its furnishings,but not all is a well-known watercourse in southern Montana named for of it-not the capacity to produce children-obviously occu- a Cheyenne episode). Role variability is the key to understand- pied an intermediate status. The notion that berdaches were ing here (see Liberty 1979, 1982). likely to be wealthy could be the result of observations that, as in our own societies, capable and hardworking but childless adults are generally more affluentthan those supporting chil- by WILLIAM K. POWERS dren, or it could stem from the supposition that persons gifted Department of Anthropology, Rutgers University, New beyond the normal capacities of their class will be materially Brunswick, N.J. 08903, U.S.A. 28 III 83 fortunate. The berdache status is still viable in Lakota society, although A minor addendum: Miller (1974) is relevant to discussion transvestism is less so because whites consider it unacceptable of the Iroquois. (or it is obfuscated owing to acceptable trends in unisexual dress). The role of go-between in amorous affairs is current, the berdache (winkte) customarily being a female's cross-cou- by JOHANN KNOBLOCH sin. Winktes are characterized as robust: they walk long dis- Venusbergweg34, D-5300 Bonn 1, Federal Republic of Ger- tances carrying heavy loads through severe weather. They many. 2 IV 83 perform occupations considered female, working long hours Having read this very informative article, I have a lot of ques- without complaining. They are regarded as intelligent, kind, tions: thoughtfulhuman beings who take care of the old and feeble. 1. What is the origin of the term "berdache"? I haven't been In contrast, "homosexuals" are ridiculed by males, and vivid able to find an explanation of this term even in Stoutenburgh's descriptions of homosexual behavior are frequentlythe subject Dictionary of the American Indian or the Encyclopedia Bri- of conversation at all-male drinking parties. Older people view tannica. winktes in their traditional roles without stigma; younger peo- 2. Is there any documentation of a belief in the transmigra- ple associate them with homosexuality. tion of souls among these tribes? If there were, it seems possible Hassrick's interpretationof berdaches as "sissies" and "mam- to me that a berdache could be a man with a feminine soul- ma's boys," however, is inconsistent with Lakota ideology: and this "mistake" might be manifested in feminine behavior winktes are wakan, "sacred." Some receive instructions in vi- during childhood which would be noticed by the adults in the sions from Anuk ite ("Double Face"), a symbol of proper and child's environment and by the child in his later life. improper marital behavior (Powers 1977), who offersthem a 3. If berdaches give children secret names, might it be be- choice (she never orders them). M. N. Powers (1980) reports cause they have more experience in things of the other world? that winktes also are influenced by the moon and dream of Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October1983 461 menstruatingwomen and pte winkte, a "dry buffalo cow." Dev- this paper, as it deals only with North America. For the second, ereux betrays his own ethnocentrism when he states that ber- however, Callender and Kochems provide some hints. They daches receive "protection" through institutionalization and propose that male transvestism was absent fromthe Arctic and that cross-dressing prevents berdaches from "recruiting" un- Subarctic because male labor was too valuable to have been suspecting heterosexuals. Similarly, Hassrick's contention that lost; later they remark that freedom from child care allowed berdaches were "punished" in the afterlifeand Lame Deer's the male berdache to be more productive than the normal idea that a boy should refrain from long-term relationships female (to this we can add freedom from the energy drains of with them are clearly non-Indian. pregnancy and lactation). Clearly, a thread of economic cau- It is unlikely that fear of hunting and war figuredas a reason sality runs through their work, although it has not been de- for becoming a berdache; winktes participated in both. Today veloped into a hypothesis. individual winktes usually hunt alone for deer or small game The hypotheses they discuss all ask why certain people be- and do not join in hunting parties. Perhaps in the past the same come berdaches, not why the institution exists at all. The ho- was true. mosexual hypothesis and the weakling (inability to assume male I agree with the authors' preferencefor "gender mixing" over roles) hypothesis are clearly wrong. Furthermore, these deal "gender crossing" because "mixing" may be in fact short-term. with psychological dispositions that are just as applicable to Equally provocative is their referenceto the fact that an Amer- idiosyncratic transvestism as to the institutionalized form. The ican performer"in drag" may be a "she" but never a "woman." European explanation, that the berdache combines male and (This would be impossible in Lakota, where sexually differ- female powers into a unity of spiritual power, illuminates some entiated pronouns do not exist and anyone "in drag" would but not all cases, as Callender and Kochems point out. White- always be winkte.) While the authors would not compare the head's hypothesis of occupational prestige has more credibility two cultures "except insofar as berdache status could be called in theireyes, but I concur with theircriticism of this hypothesis, a performance," there are some cases in which the comparison which rests on an assumption that men were considered su- can be made: some short-termgender mixing could indeed be perior to women throughout North America. Compared with called a performance. We can thus distinguish between the other world regions, this is a region of widespread parity of berdache and the heyoka (Lakota for "contrary"), who fre- the sexes, particularly in gathering (as opposed to hunting) and quently dresses or speaks in the manner of a female. Thus the horticultural societies. distinction between winkte and heyoka is contextual, not cat- While theydo not develop an explanatory hypothesis,I would egorical. If the gender mixing is temporary,there is no reason like to use their data to propose one. There are three classes to assume either that homosexuality leads to berdache status of societies with the berdache status: those in which it has been or that homosexuality is a secondary phenomenon following reported for men only, those in which it has been reported for the assumption of berdache status. Perhaps in some societies women only, and those in which it has been reported for both the berdache has no sexual connotation at all. We are certainly sexes. The firstclass greatly outnumbers the other two. While not ready to assume in our society that college men are potential this could be an artifactof reporting,it could also reflectreality. homosexuals because of their transvestite performance in, say, Given permissiveness within a society toward sex-role transfer, a Princeton Triangle show. it may be that men are more likely to suffersex-role dvsfunction I also support the authors' position that assumption of ber- than women. I find this less plausible than another argument, dache status does not necessarily have any bearing on the over- which is that where reproduction is a matter of grave concern, worked equation of "male" with "superior" and "female" with as it generally is in societies with small and fluctuating pop- "inferior,"which certainly does not hold for the Lakota, as ulations, societies are unfriendly toward the loss of a fertile M. N. Powers (1982) has recently shown. woman from the reproductive pool. The same would be even Berdache status will continue to be controversial not because more true of matrilineal societies, where the matrilineage might it suggests sexual "aberration," but because its history is so resist the loss of a reproductive member. sketchy. It is perhaps an appropriate commentary on our so- Several of the female-berdachesocieties are matrilineal:Crow, ciety that we become concerned with the sexual customs of Kaska, Navaho, and Western Apache. In none of these is there "tribal" people just at a time when we question what is proper a strong lineage or clan structure, compared with matrilineal and what is not in our own sexuality. Today our preoccupation Pueblos or Central or Eastern matrilineal tribes. The case of with legalizing sexual behaviors that have been stigmatized as the Kaska is instructive. Honigmann (1954:129-30) notes that "perverse" and the proliferation of scholarship on the social families will turn a daughter into a berdache only if they have and cultural constructionof gender are cases in point. Callender no son. This is permitted but not entirely approved. Female and Kochems are to be congratulated on their timely contri- transvestism is generally not institutionalized to the same de- bution. The article is a welcome addition to the study of human gree as male: for example, while the Mohave male berdache sexuality, mixed or not. undergoes a special initiation ceremony, the female berdache does not. This may reflectsome ambivalence toward the female berdache even in societies that tolerate her. by ALICE SCHLEGEL My hypothesis is that male berdaches are tolerated or en- Department of Anthropology,University of Arizona, Tucson, couraged where two conditions obtain: (1) female labor is highly Ariz. 85721, U.S.A. 11 Iv 83 valued and (2) there is an actual or potential shortage of female Callender and Kochems have done an impressive job of fer- labor. As to the first, female labor could be valuable either reting out and synthesizing available material on the berdache because women make a large contribution to subsistence or phenomenon. The material they bring together gives rise to because women produce a craft item that is highly valued for two important theoretical questions. First, is institutional exchange. The first case includes gathering and most horti- transvestism more widespread in North America than in other cultural societies in North America, while the second includes world regions, and, if so, why? Second, how do we account such societies as the Pueblos, where women produced valuable for the distribution of male only, female only, and both-sex pottery, and postcontact Plains and Navaho, where women berdaches? (Admittedly, in this type of historical reconstruc- produced valuable beadwork and rugs, respectively. Female tion, where one depends on often casual remarks by observers, berdaches are tolerated, but probably not encouraged, in so- there is always the chance that the distribution as reported is cieties where (1) females make a lesser contribution to pro- an artifactof reportage rather than a reflectionof ethnographic duction than men and (2) male labor is in actual or potential reality.) short supply. In essence, this hypothesis states that the insti- The firstquestion cannot be answered by analyzing data in tution of the berdache is a mechanism by which societies with

462 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY uncertain sex ratios can regulate theirlabor supply, giving them Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE a greater flexibilitythan exists in societies where one's sex is the only determinant of one's gender. The concentration of which the attributesof berdaches were a very important variety berdache societies seems to be in western and central North but not necessarily superior to other kinds." It strikes me that America, where foraging and marginal horticulture provided their reservations are weakly grounded, particularly since they a less certain food supply and militated against the growth of themselves emphasize a set of elements that tend in this very large stable populations. direction: I did a cross-cultural test of female contribution to subsis- 1. Supernatural powers are attributed to berdaches, and they tence, one element of this hypothesis, using data from Barry have specific ritual responsibilities (funerals, conferringof se- and Schlegel (1982). I tested societies with male berdaches only cret names, warfare, and others) that in some societies are also against those with female berdaches present (with or without performed by women who have passed the menopause, that the male form) for high versus low contribution to subsistence. is, are no longer impeded by impurity and are "naturally" High-contribution societies are those in which women contrib- gender-mixed. ute 35 % or more to subsistence (the mean is 35.5 %). The sample 2. The necessity that a group have berdaches is apparent, with informationon both female contributionand the berdache and not just in special cases such as that of the Tlingit, who status contains 18 societies (see table 1). The results did not believe berdaches are reincarnated in a given clan, or the 17th- reach the level of significance; however, the distribution is not century Yuma, who had a rule that there always befour ber- inconsistent with this hypothesis. I did not include production daches (Alarc6n 1565:368). There is constant concern to iden- of high-value crafts in the test, as there is no coded measure tify individuals who show ambiguous sexual tendencies and for this. There is also no coded measure for actual or potential push them into the role of berdaches. There is also concern to shortage of female labor, an essential feature of this hypothesis. guarantee that the role be "filled" through the means of a "call" With such a restrictedset of societies to work with as the North (dream or vision) on the part of supernatural beings, in some American societies that practice institutionalized transvestism, cases with the support of myth. an analysis along these lines should not be too difficult. 3. The very element of gender mixing, which the authors rightlysee as a defining feature of berdaches and which they distinguish from gender crossing, points to the fact that what by ITALO SIGNORINI is being sought is a conjunction of sexual opposites. (Since this Istituto di Etnologia, Universita di Roma, Rome, Italy. 5 is normally linked with the presence of androgynous super- IV 83 natural beings, it would certainlyrequire furtherattention than We owe a debt of gratitude to Callender and Kochems for their it has had so far [see Kluckhohn 1960:52; Baumann 1950].) brilliant revival of discussion of the subject of transvestism in The authors provide much information on this subject. They North America. Much has been said on the subject but not in also mention female divinities connected with the "call" to take an analytic vein. Their work considers the phenomenon ex- up the role of berdache, and this agrees perfectlywith Bau- haustively and distinguishes it from homosexuality, which is mann (1950:23), who says that transvestism sometimes aims properly considered something that transcends transvestism. simply at uniting the physical and spiritual qualities of the two It also considers berdache variations, spread, and connections, sexes, while at other times it aims at adjusting to a supernatural and this is in itself a great achievement. It does not, however, being that is androgynous or of the opposite sex. Moreover, take up the problem of why the institution exists-what its Eliade (1971:100) noted that "wholeness" may be expressed by original meaning is-although at several points, especially in any pair of opposites (female-male, visible-invisible, sky-earth, the discussion of ontogeny,it does break new interpretiveground light-dark), a notion not infrequentlyfound in North America. in which the religious aspect seems clear. The authors say that Eliade goes on to say (p. 106) that the union of the two sexes "the primary locus of [berdaches'] holiness and power was the can be achieved on the level of symbol or expressed ritually gender mixing that characterized their status," but the cause- and hence concretely and that "there is a full range of inter- and-effect relationship should be explained. The authors ex- mediate types." I should add that the berdache status is a press reservations about "European" interpretations(e.g., Bau- cultural element like any other. It may spread to other groups mann 1950, 1955; Eliade 1971) that consider berdache as part and may be integrated by the receiving groups in ways that of a much more widespread pattern of institutionalized are very differentfrom those of the groups that spread it. transvestism, a primarily religious phenomenon in which spe- The fact remains, however, that transvestism may be con- cial value is given to androgyny as the conjunction of the male/ sidered in a strictlyNorth American context only in terms of female opposition. The authors' reservations are based on the limited aims. Otherwise the phenomenon has to be considered consideration that "some ethnographic accounts describe ber- in a broader perspective (the rest of the American continent dache as an essentially secular phenomenon," that "religious alone provides abundant material) and in comparative terms. concepts consonant with those stressed by the European school Some marginal remarks: It is surprising that no referenceis of thought are scattered throughout American Indian cultures made to Munroe, Whiting, and Hally (1969), who examined but seem much less systematized," and that "North American the hypothesis that institutionalized male transvestism tends concepts of individual relations with the supernatural allowed to appear in societies "that make minimum use of sex as a many persons to obtain various kinds of superior qualities, of discriminatingfactor in prescribing behavior" and not in those

TABLE 1

SEX OF BERDACHES AND FEMALE CONTRIBUTION TO SUBSISTENCE SEX OF BERDACHES

FEMALE Ethnographic Atlas Code Standard Sample Code SUBSISTENCE Female Female CONTRIBUTION Male only present Male only present

High ...... 7 7 6 2 Low ...... 4 4 5 5 SOURCE Barryand Schlegel(1982)

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 463 that "maximize sex distinction" (p. 38). This hypothesis may status and why there are many or few people holding it. Ma- help to explain certain blanks in the distribution of the phe- terialist and idealist answers are likely to run in counterpoint nomenon and to explain its connection with individual ten- here. dencies, a connection that, formulated in another fashion, is properly rejected by the authors as an "extreme oversimplifi- cation." A final point: The text says that the Iroquois certainly did not have berdaches because there is absolutely no mention of Reply the phenomenon in the literature.Actually, de Charlevoix speaks of it (1744:4-5). by CHARLES CALLENDER and LEE M. KOCHEMS Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A. 18 V 83 Addressing 15 comments, often overlapping, poses problems by ANDREW STRATHERN of organization that we think are best handled by grouping the Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies, Box 1432, Boroko, information and opinions they contain into three topical cat- Papua New Guinea. 25 iv 83 egories: the berdache institution itself, methodology, and ex- This is a very level-headed and praiseworthy approach to a planatory hypotheses. complex and puzzling phenomenon. The berdache status, itself The berdache institution. Trying to achieve a contextual varying considerably from culture to culture, shows an inter- definitionof berdache status, we consciously omitted any ety- mediate logical possibility between the genders "male" and mological discussion of the word "berdache," a label originally "female." The authors quite rightlyargue that it is to be under- applied by outsiders to the phenomena examined here. Se- stood firstin terms of social and cultural logic and only sec- mantic change has now confined the term to this context, which ondarily in terms of individual psychological motivations. This the word's earlier pejorative meaning distorted. We overlooked status is not found in the two societies of Papua New Guinea Hultkrantz's point, apparently concurred in by Jacobs and where I have worked, but basic ideas of gender crossing and underlined by Knobloch's question. The statements by Hult- gender mixing are found, and these appear to be the secular krantz and Jacobs, if not entirely agreeing, seem sufficient; bases fromwhich the institutionwas constructed among North Guerra (1971:43) gives a slightly differentetymology for the American Indians. In Hagen the idea of gender crossing is quite Spanish form, bardaje. explicit: insofar as a woman can do things that make her "big," Our delineation of berdache distribution needs less redraw- or "prestigeful," she is gaining access to something which is ing than we expected, with the northernAthabaskans the most stamped as "male." Conversely, a male who shows weakness important exception. We unfortunatelymissed Broch's (1977) or does not performas he should is described as "rubbish" and article documenting berdache status among the Hare. While as tending towards the "female." Activities normally performed his Chipewyan, Dogrib, and Kutchin examples may have been by women do not, however, necessarily have to be avoided by similar to the Piegan "manly-hearts,"that berdaches were prob- men. For example, women ordinarily and predominantly roll ably widespread among northern Athabaskans (cf. Rogers the thread which is used to make aprons and head-nets for 1981:27) seems likely. We would now move the Slave from men, but a few men also do this and are praised for their doubtful to definite and revise our statement about the atten- industry rather than looked down upon. Similarly, among the uation of berdache status in the Subarctic. Wiru, a woman who undertakes men's work in gardening is Signorini notes that Charlevoix ascribed berdaches to the praised for her strength; women are also praised in both so- Iroquois. We don't have this referencebut had rejected a similar cieties for their strengthin their own spheres of work, such as statement in his Journal of a Voyage to North America pig keeping and childbearing. It is clear that prestige attaches (1923[1720]:73-74) as unreliable, not supported by Jesuits who to success in these activities, but in Hagen a furthersphere of worked among Iroquois groups and conflictingwith the omis- prestige specific to men is constructed from an ideology of sion of the Iroquois in Lafitau's comparable passage (17 24:603- ceremonial exchange. 4). We might add that Loskiel's (1794:11) report of homosex- Actual transvestism is quite differentfrom the above, as is uality among the Delaware and apparently the Iroquois (Katz the actual incidence of intersexualityor sex change. Transves- 1976:290) did not describe berdache behavior. The case for the tism in Hagen and Wiru has solely to do with making political absence of berdaches among Iroquois cultures is strong. Kehoe statements: women are dressed as men to say "Even our women points out that Miller (1974) reached a similar conclusion. Brown are as strong as your men," or men dressed as women to say terms it "clearly documented." "You are arguing that our men are weak as women, but you We agree with Hultkrantz that the Wind River Shoshoni will see." It is confined to ceremonial contexts. As to intersex- berdache status strengthensthe case for its presence among the uality, I know of two cases from Wiru. In one the person acted closely related Comanche, but this remains a probability rather as a man and married a wife but could never impregnate her; than a certainty. his rudimentarypenis was too small. Nevertheless, they stayed Although Jacobs disagrees that berdache distribution in the as husband and wife, and the husband was a great fighterand Southwest seems less pervasive than in some other areas, we worker. In the other case the intersexual desired to be a woman think the evidence at hand supports our conclusion. Berdaches and was not short of suitors because, again, she was a strong are not documented for the Plateau Yumans, the Eastern Pueb- worker (something Wiru intersexuals are known for). In Hagen los, or the Jicarilla and Mescalero Apache. I know of one case: a girl decided she was really a boy as she Turning to comments about berdache characteristics, Pow- grew up and indeed is now accepted as a man and is married, ers's description of these among the Lakota (Teton Dakota) again without children. In 1964 I also saw one man who wore provides richly detailed ethnographic data for ready compar- a headcloth as women do and walked about with the women, ison with informationfrom other cultures. His clarification of despite the fact that he was heavily bearded and middle-aged. related problems raised by earlier studies of this culture has His activities were tolerated with amusement by other men. far-reaching implications. Powers explicitly denies that their My point in citing these anecdotes is to reinforce the sug- accounts of prejudice against berdaches, often cited in the lit- gestion that it is not in isolated individual cases of sex change erature, express native Lakota sentiments. These pejorative or sex ambiguity that the origin of berdache-type institutions statements have a very different significance when seen as is to be sought, but in the social logic of gender construction. contamination by American views. Nevertheless, there has to be a social psychology which is Knobloch asks whether belief in the transmigrationof souls capable of explaining how individuals are inducted into the might have provided an explanation forberdaches as men with

464 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY femininesouls. Such a belief, if it existed, was not widespread. Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE The concept of a feminine soul in a male body seems to us essentially Western, explicitly advanced by Ulrichs to explain ta, even without transvestism. Landes describes Santee Dakota homosexuals as a third sex (DeCicco 1981:33) and still held in (1969:112-13) and Potawatomi (1970:26, 195-98) males inter- some quarters (cf. Russo 1981:55). As for Knobloch's other ested in some aspects of women's work who informantsagreed questions, belief in their special supernatural power underlay would have become berdaches in the past; here the status seems the Lakota practice of asking berdaches to name children. no longer viable. At what point, then, do berdaches go un- Hassrick (1971:273) reports a belief that these names might derground but persist, and at what later point does their be- conferlonglife. Powers (1977:38), however, relates this practice havior become vestigial? The factors modifyingor destroying to another belief, that berdaches had "auspicious powers re- the status, very complex and indirect as well as obvious, also lated to childbirth and child-rearing." We don't have specific need more attention. We agree with Broch's suggestion that informationabout the speech forms that berdaches used. contact may also have introduced or redefinedoccupations that Liberty's suggestion that northern Plains priests might have made the assumption of berdachehood unnecessary. transferred power to each other through the mediation of a Methodology. Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg's comment, involving berdache with whom both had sexual intercourse is provoca- conceptual and methodological issues, seems to stress the latter. tive, but we have no confirmingevidence. Our disagreement with her is pronounced. While ultimately Jacobs properly objects to our poorly worded statement that concerned with gender mixing on a broad scale, we limited berdaches did not hold formal offices. We should have said this firstphase of our study to North America, where it was that they did not hold formal political offices directly related common (perhaps even, as Schlegel notes, particularly wide- to their gender status. DuMont's (Swanton 1911:100) tantaliz- spread), where the cultures shared enough features to facilitate ingly fragmentary reference to a Natchez berdache as "this comparison, and where we had better control of the literature. pretended chief of the women" might imply an exception, but Before undertaking a broader study we wanted to reach a his meaning is unclear. We also agree with Jacobs that the roles definitionof its North American forms. This explicitly limited berdaches performedas such could have been defined as offices. aim, carrying some disadvantages, offers important compen- Much research obviously remains to be done on defining sations and is legitimate. In deducing features of berdache berdache status and delineating its functions. Hultkrantz's re- status, we used data from every time period, evaluating these port that the Shoshoni defined berdaches as one of five rec- and trying to filter out the effects of postcontact changes as ognized categories of men who abstained from heterosexual well as the errors or biases of observers. This method seems relations has important implications. An untrained observer preferable to assuming that all variations in the status result might have extended the berdache label to some of these other from Western contact. Our general avoidance of individual categories, which still other societies may have merged. Defi- psychology, discussed below, was deliberate and justified. Fi- nitions of berdaches probably varied by culture more than the nally, the few statements we found describing women as hostile literature suggests, and some persons it describes as berdaches toward berdaches (e.g., Romans 1962:82-83) were brief, un- may not have been defined as such. convincing, and sometimes derivative. Jacobs's description of the Tewa quetho, a status that does Datan wishes we had mentioned the Nacirema. We did, not fitour definitionof berdache, raises furtherproblems. Did implicitly,throughout the article. Most accounts of berdaches other North American cultures have categories like the quetho? were written by Nacirema, lay or anthropologist, many of Should the definitionbe reworded to include quetho status, or whom insistedon viewing or analyzing them in Nacirema terms. was this a differentdevelopment that perhaps inhibited the Unless we completely misunderstand her, Datan perpetuates appearance of berdaches? One possible solution is to shiftem- this cultural attitude by equating berdaches with slauxesomoh, phasis to berdaches as one widespread variety of gender mix- a subgroup whom Nacirema social scientists defined as very ing, which also subsumed such statuses as the quetho and rare and whose male members they viewed as gender-defective included temporary contextual or situational gender mixing and rather like females, a condition often blamed on their behavior by nonberdache males. The Blackfoot holy man cited mothers but sometimes regarded as contagious. The Theban by Kehoe, performingin this capacity, cross-dressed and sim- seer Teiresias, as we recall, turned into a woman when, en- ulated lactation when conferringpower on other men. Powers countering two copulating snakes, he killed the female; and describes temporary gender mixing by the Lakota heyoka. returned to male form seven years later when, under similar Broch, whose Hare example shows shifts into and out of ber- circumstances, he killed the male. We class this as gender cross- dache behavior, suggests that we might have given more at- ing, rather than gender mixing. tentionto situational role behavior, which we agree is significant. Granzberg's comment is puzzling. While criticizing us for Holmberg's call for intensive comparison of variations in the not having written a differentarticle, his perceptions of this berdache institutionby culture area and forcomparing cultures one seem unique, even his calling it a tabulation. We admit with berdaches and those lacking these defines another im- that it includes two tables. Of the "previous tabulations" he portant direction for research. Brown, agreeing with this last wanted us to appraise more fully, the only really comparable point, suggests that one common berdache function, that of article is Jacobs (1968). Where we cover the same points, we go-between, was assumed among the Iroquois by older women, are in essential agreement. Katz (1976), as we pointed out, is who arranged marriages. While their role does not seem really a compilation of documents about American Indian homosex- comparable to the carryingof messages by berdaches, we agree uality, and not comparable. Forgey (1975), as we also pointed with her emphasis on the parallels between berdaches and out, covers the northernPlains, not North America. We noted postmenopausal women. our agreements and disagreements with Signorini (1972) and Another set of unresolved problems concerns postcontact Whitehead (1981). We could have gone throughBenedict (1934), changes in berdache status. If knowledge of its traditionalforms pointing out errors sentence by sentence, but this seemed un- has many gaps, information about its current forms is even necessary. His referenceto Arens also puzzles us. Does he view more limited. Powers's and Broch's accounts, taken together, berdaches as a myth? If he means that the sources have to be illustrate the range of contemporary berdache behavior. Lib- evaluated with care, so they do; as we noted. We did not argue erty's Cheyenne example shows the persistence even of that females dominated social life among American Indians. transvestism, its least viable aspect. A very basic problem- The questions with which we ended were suggested directions here we again agree with Jacobs-involves the definition of for future research, not our central hypotheses. berdache status when only som-eof its traditional features are Explanatory hypotheses. The explanatory hypotheses most evident. Powers describes it as clearly viable among the Lako- explicitly discussed in the comments include one specific prob-

Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October1983 465 lem, the rare occurrence of female berdaches. Otherwise they status is essentially "a mechanism by which societies with un- center on the berdache institution as a whole. certain sex ratios can regulate their labor supply." One of us Three comments suggest reasons female berdaches were rarer doubts that her hypothesis will meet all cases. Liberty's com- than males. Datan's suggestion that male berdaches tended to ment supports it, but Broch points out that our linking of the have male privileges, apparently based on an equation with attenuation of the institution with the specific nature of Sub- American homosexuals, does not explain the differencein fre- arctic subsistence economy rests on a misunderstanding of its quency. Brown cites studies based on experiments at feeding sexual division of labor. We both agree that the line of research stations for deer, showing that they avoid food scented with Schlegel has outlined, which has the furthermerit of accounting human blood and suggesting that menstruating females would for the presence or absence of female berdaches, is a very draw a similar reaction. These contexts don't seem really equiv- important one to pursue. alent. Given the importance of hunting as an occupation for Another explanatory hypothesis approaches berdache status female berdaches, however, and perhaps adding the Mohave as essentially a religious phenomenon. One form, not covered statements that they did not menstruate (much), this hypoth- in the article, is Thayer's (1980) analysis of the northernPlains esis, if confirmed, would be significant. We are most attracted berdache, which, as several comments note, we had over- by Schlegel's hypothesis that societies concerned with repro- looked. Thayer sees the berdache as "straddling" the worlds duction would not encourage the loss of fertile females from of men and women. He describes them as "interstitial," in the breeding pool. The evidence, as she notes, seems to support Douglas's sense, being both male and female and neither male her subsidiary argument that repression or discouragement of nor female. This feature gave them power to mediate between female berdaches was strongest where strong matrilineal de- men and women and, through the visions that validated their scent groups existed. status, to mediate between the human and divine worlds. We The four broad explanatory hypotheses for the berdache agree with Thayer in some respects. A weak point in his ar- institution-psychological, economic, religious, and gender- gument is the ambivalence he postulates in cultural attitudes construction-may be used as alternatives or combined. We toward berdaches among northern Plains tribes. Admitting see each of these as an important aspect of the status. that this was not evident among the Cheyenne, he draws his We rejected the psychological approach, explicitlywhen con- specific examples from the Lakota. But Powers's comment in- sidering its two subsidiary hypotheses and implicitlyby silence. dicates that the ambivalence described for the Lakota was Thayer (1980:288) also rejects it, arguing that it takes berdache intrusive, Western in origin, and not indigenous. We are not behavior out of its cultural context, emphasizing its genital certain that berdaches mediated between men and women, aspects (a point Kehoe also notes) and reducing it to a form of apart from acting as go-betweens. Although they could be sha- sexual activity. We would add two furthercriticisms. Grounded mans, only some of them had this role, and in spite of their in Western folk beliefs about gender, homosexuality, and resemblances to shamans we would not call them such. In any transvestism, this approach well illustrates Sahlins's (1976:75) case, many other persons had vision experiences, and some of point that the "etic" in cultural analysis is usually the "emic" these also mediated with the supernatural. of the anthropologist's society. Moreover, it seldom attempts Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg, Hultkrantz, and Signorini criticize our to explain more than individual motivations for assuming the reservations about the religious approach in general. We agree status. that berdache status was a religious phenomenon and is legit- We are surprised that this approach has drawn very little imately examined as such. The reservations we expressed cen- defense in the comments, except perhaps those noting our fail- teron our view that its analysis in termsof any single dimension ure to discuss the articles by Munroe, Whiting, and Hally (1969) is not incorrect, but incomplete. and Munroe and Munroe (1977). The formerstudy concludes Hultkrantz's suggestion that berdache status is "a variation that transvestism is most common in societies with relatively of an ancient shamanistic practice" obviously deserves consid- few sex distinctions and suggests that these conditions facilitate eration. But even if this was its origin, it has added other gender crossing. While we dislike its terminology,the argument dimensions, and not only through Western contact. Often tied seems reasonable. Munroe and Munroe (1977), more explicitly to vision experience, the status also existed in societies where psychological in approach, conclude that male transvestism is visions were much less important or even absent. All Yurok highly correlated with subsistence economies to which males shamans were berdaches; but shamanism, monopolized by make greater quantitative contributions. This seems unlikely. women and male berdaches, was an importantsource of income Given a normal sex ratio, one would expect such societies to in Yurok society, whose elite (Pilling 1978:112) emphasized discourage the practice. Without supporting data, the argu- wealth and property. ment cannot be evaluated, but we reject its explicit premise Signorini, after a disarming opening, presses a vigorous (and that berdache status is an "escape mechanism" from the "rig- entirelyfair) attack, using as weapons berdache characteristics orous male role" and the implicit assumption that a male ber- we had emphasized. His firstpoint is that berdaches had super- dache did only women's work. natural powers and specific ritual responsibilities. They did, In rejecting most applications of the psychological approach, but the latter seem not to have been universal and we are not we are not denying the importance of this aspect of the berdache sure the formerwere. His second point is also very important; status, but expressing dissatisfaction with the concepts and many North American societies regarded berdaches as essen- techniques this approach uses. We agree with Strathern that tial. But again, not all societies held this view. Third, he holds "there has to be a social psychology which is capable of ex- that gender mixing, as "a conjunction of sexual opposites," is plaining how individuals are inducted into the status and why normally linked with deities who are androgynous or the re- there are many or few people holding it" but haven't yet found verse of the gender-mixer's anatomical sex. We grant the ex- it. istence of a widespread religious complex that subsumes gender A second explanatory hypothesis is economic. Schlegel notes mixing as an aspect. But gender mixing, as Strathern's com- the clear thread of economic causality running through the ment indicates, may also be entirely secular. In American In- article. The junior author wanted to develop this into a hy- dian cultures the divine world tended to suffuse the secular, pothesis; the senior author had reservations. Schlegel also points and many forms of behavior had both aspects. Their analysis out (very tactfully)a major weakness in our treatment of this may stress either aspect. aspect. Emphasizing the economic advantages berdaches de- Signorini observes that berdache status, as it spread, could rived from their status and the gender-mixing activities at- be integrated in various ways into cultures. This point, added tached to it, we did not examine these from the standpoint of to his earlier statement about the status's "original meaning," theirsocieties. She does so, impressively,arguing that berdache may elucidate the crux of our disagreement with him, Hult-

466 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY krantz, and probably Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg. We are not dealing Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE with the institution's original meaning or attempting to deter- mine this. Whether we should be doing so is another issue. We BEALS, RALPH L. 1933. Ethnology of the Nisenac. University of Cal- are concerned with the status in the recent historical past. ifornia Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 31(6). BENEDICT, RUTH. 1934. Anthropology and the abnormal. Perhaps we could negotiate a truce, based on Journal of mutual recog- General Psychology 10:59-82 nition that, within a broad range of agreement, they and we . 1939. Sex in primitive society. American Journal of Ortho- are concentrating on somewhat differentproblems and thus psychiatry 9:570-75. emphasizing slightlydifferent aspects. And while we hold that BIRKET-SMITH, KAJ, and FREDERICA DE LAGUNA. 1937 The Eyak in Indians of the Copper River delta, Alaska. K0benhavn: Levin and an analysis terms of a single dimension is incomplete, we Munksgaard. concede that limiting our analysis to North America opens us BLACK HAWK. 1955. Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak, Black Hawk: An au- to a similar criticism. tobiography. Edited by Donald Jackson. Urbana: University of Il- The fourth approach to berdache status is analysis in terms linois Press. BLEIBTREU-EHRENBERG, GISELA. of gender construction. Strathern, whose comment directlyad- 1970. Homosexualitat und Trans- vestition im Schamanismus. Anthropos 65.189-228. dresses this point, describes examples of secular gender mixing BOSCANA, GERONIMO. 1978. Chinigchinich. Banning, Calif.. Malki and gender crossing in New Guinea, which we welcome as Museum Press. indications that such phenomena may be a significantelement Bossu, JEAN-BERNARD. 1962. Jean-Bernard Bossu's travels in the interior of North America in the berdache institution. 1751-1762. Translated and edited by Sey- mour Feiler. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Within this overall approach, the issue of gender-related BOWERS, ALFRED. 1950. Mandan social and ceremonial organization. status asymmetry in North America seems the most contro- Chicago: University of Chicago Press. versial. Jacobs, Kehoe, Powers, and Schlegel take positions . 1965. Hidatsa social and ceremonial organization. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 194 similar to ours. Perhaps we could infer Broch's as agreement BOYCE, DOUGLAS W. 1978. "Iroquoian tribes of the Virginia-North well, given his statement that the openness of political perfor- Carolina coastal plain," in Handbook of North American Indians, mance among Hare women is new. This agreement, particu- vol. 15. Edited by Bruce G. Trigger, pp. 2 82-89 Washington, D.C.: larly by those who have done fieldwork among American Smithsonian Institution. BRADBURY, JOHN. 1904. Travels in the zn Indians, strengthensour perception that model in interior ofAmerica the years Whitehead's 1809, 1810, and 1811. (Early western travels, edited by Reuben G. this respect is essentially based on Western concepts. Liberty Thwaites, vol. 14.) Cleveland: Arthur H. Clark. takes a very differentposition that, opposing ours, also disa- BROCH, HARALD B. 1977. A note on berdache among the Hare Indians grees with Whitehead. Having read only the more popular of northwesternCanada. WesternCanadian Journal ofA nthropology 7:95-101. of her we her [HBB] version (1982) published argument, respect po- BROWN, JUDITH K. 1970. A note on the division of labor by sex. sition but are far from complete acceptance of it. American Anthropologist 72:1073-78. [JKB] Holmberg, whose comment also centers on gender construc- . 1975. "Iroquois women: An ethnohistorical note," in Toward tion (and notes the status asymmetry issue), concentrates on an anthropology of women. Edited by Rayna R Reiter, pp. 235-5 1. York: three where we with of New Monthly Review Press. points disagree Whitehead's analysis 1982. Cross-cultural perspectives on middle-aged women the berdache status. In all three, our knowledge of American CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY23.143-56. [JKB] Indian cultures led us to mistrust the logic of Whitehead's BROWN, KYLE ELAINE. 1982. Your context or mine? A feminist anal- model of gender, production, and prestige in North America, ysis examined. Unpublished M Sc. paper, London School of Eco- which seemed to rest on far too narrow a data base in nomics, London, England. and, CARR, LUCIEN. n.d. The mounds of the Mississippi Valley, historically spite of her excellent discussion of gender, to include many considered. Reprinted from Memoirs of the Kentucky Geological concepts that were basically Western and not really transferable Survey 2. (cf. K. Brown 1982). We are not yet ready to propose an al- CATLIN, GEORGE. 1973. Letters and notes on the manners, customs, and conditions of the North American Indians. 2 vols. New York. ternative model. Holmberg's points are important. Besides Dover. demonstrating again that berdache status obviously needs fur- CHARLEVOIX, PIERRE-FRAN(OIS-XAVIER DE 1744. Histozre et de- ther study, they mark out directions for future research on the scription generale de la Nouvelle France. Vol. 6. Paris: Nyon. [IS] total sex-gender systems of North American societies. . 1923 (1720). Journal of a voyage to North America. Vol. 2. Edited by Louise Phelps Kellogg. Chicago. Caxton Club CLINE, WALTER. 1938. "Religion and world view," in The Sinkaietk or southern Okanogan. Edited by Leslie Spier, pp. 131-49. (General Series in Anthropology 6.) Menasha, Wis.: George Banta. COSTANSO, MIGUEL. 1910. The narrative of the Portola expedition of 1769-1770. Edited by Adolph Van Hemeri-Engert and Frederick J ReferencesCited Teggard. (Publications of the Academy of Pacific Coast History 1[4].) 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468 CURRENT ANTHROPOLOGY account of his experiences amongfur traders and American Indians Callenderand Kochems: THE BERDACHE on the Mississippi and Missouri rivers during the years 1846 to 1852. Edited by J. N. B. Hewitt Bureau of American Ethnology internal secretions. Edited by William C. Young, vol. 2, pp. 1433- Bulletin 115. 79. Baltimore. Williams and Wilkins. LAFITAU, JOSEPH FRANCOIS. 1724. Moeurs des sauvagesameriquains, MEMBRE, ZENOBIUS. 1922. "Narrative of LaSalle's voyage down the comparees aux moeurs des premiers temps. Vol. 1. Paris: Saugrain Mississippi, by Father Zenobius Membre, Recollect," in The journeys l'aine. of Rene Robert Cavelier Sieur de la Salle. Edited by Isaac Joslin LANDES, RUTH 1968. The Mystic Lake Sioux. Madison University Cox, pp. 131-59. New York: Allerton. of Wisconsin Press. MEYER, Roy W. 1977. The village Indians of the upper Missouri. . 1970. The Prairie Potawatomi. Madison: University of Wis- Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. consin Press. 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Vol. 24 * No. 4 * August-October 1983 469 Russo, VITO. 1981. The celluloid closet: Homosexuality in the movies. John Tanner. Edited by Edwin James. Minneapolis: Ross and Haines. New York: Harper and Row. TEIT, JAMES. 1900. The Thompson Indians ofBritish Columbia. Amer- SAfHLINS, MARSHALL. 1976. Culture and practical reason. Chicago: ican Museum of Natural History Memoir 2, pt. 4. University of Chicago Press. . 1906. The Lillouet Indians. American Museum of Natural SAPIR, EDWARD, and LESLIE SPIER. 1943. Notes on the culture of the History Memoir 4, pt. 5. Yana. University of California Anthropological Records 3(3). * 1930. The Salishan tribes of the western plateau. Bureau of SCHAEFFER, CLAUDE E. 1976. "The Kutenai female berdache," in Gay American Ethnology Annual Report 5. American history. Edited by Jonathan Katz, pp. 293-98. New York: THAYER, JAMES STEEL. 1980. The berdache of the northern Plains: Crowell. A socioreligious perspective. 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