Common Rites of Passage from Two Cultures - Research Paper Example

A vision quest occurs when a person leaves society for a certain time to meet a spiritual guide. The aim of meeting the spiritual guide is to help the participants discover things about themselves (Maloney, 2005). It has a very important survival element thus; participants come back to society as adults. A walkabout is a rite of passage in Australia. It does not have a spiritual element as compared to the above rite of passage. However, it seeks to prove one’s ability.Several similarities exist in different rites of passages.

The common US rites of passages provide individuals with incredible freedom after the transition. Also, it does not have significant spiritual elements. There are various ways through which a social ritual such as a rite of passage influences the identity formation process of adolescents (Ned, 2009). For instance, it helps to stimulate and create awareness in the whole process thus; influencing society in a valuable way (Jennie, 2009). In one way or the other, developing individual ability is achieved to help one to manage diverse challenges arising in society.

To some extent, this forms a benchmark from where the entire procedure is well understood as required.Reflecting on Erikson and Marcia’s theories, there are numerous ways through which the process of identity development is affected when the adolescent belongs to a minority group (Maloney, 2005). For example, the procedure gets slowed and overlooked, given that several precautions are not taken into consideration as required. Most remarkably, the process ends up being less appreciated as the case in a majority group.

This implies that the process remains to be less effective and tricky to apply as expected.Building on the information gathered from textbooks and the research articles, there are some basic recommendations for what the family, community, and school can do to ease the process for adolescents (Jennie, 2009). The first recommendation revolves around implementing studies on the topic of main concern. This comes with the idea to promote learners to understand what is expected of them as far as the entire process is involved (Ned, 2009).

Implementing simple ways to perform the procedure rightfully must be given priority. Noteworthy, discovering the most common ritual to fit all people can be a helpful idea.