CHAPTER TWO
11. Summary of results
In summary, the results of this study reveal that the participants, who were all women, overwhelmingly framed sexual initiation within the context of a relationship. The type of
relationship in which the initiation of sex was framed ranged from the more conservative expectation for sex to occur within the bounds of marriage, to a more liberal attitude condoning sex within the context of a romantic relationship. For older participants (those aged between 45 and 60 years), the traditional ideal of sex within the institution of marriage was strongly enforced when they were adolescents, and they described far-reaching consequences for young women who fell pregnant outside of the institution of marriage. In contrast, while the normative expectation for sex to occur within the bounds of marriage was identified by some younger participants, it certainly appeared to be less prevalent, with young people arguing that it is now acceptable to initiate sex within the context of a romantic relationship. However, from adolescents' accounts of discussions with their parents, and with mothers in particular, it appeared that parents still favour a more traditional
approach. The tendency for parents to favour sexual initiation within the context of marriage puts them out of sync with adolescents' attitudes towards sexual initiation.
Other issues pertaining to the framing of sex within the context of a relationship emerged in the findings. These included traditional values such as monogamy and abstinence. These values were prevalent across all generations of interview participants. However, it appears that the motivation for holding those values has changed slightly from the past. For example, young participants argued for abstinence as measure to reduce the risk of contracting HIV, rather than for purely ideological reasons.
Across all interview and focus group discussions heterosexuality also emerged as a dominant social and cultural ideal within this community. In nearly every account sex was framed as an exclusively heterosexual activity, indicating that this normative ideal is strongly entrenched across generations.
However, the ambivalent attitudes toward homosexuality which appeared in the Grade 8 focus group discussion, indicates that young peoples' attitudes towards homosexuality may be shifting. This relates to a central feature of peer talk identified in this study, which is that peer talk presents an opportunity to young people to talk on issues that are other wise considered to be out of bounds.
This is often done with the aim of sharing information that they have and to learn abut new things.
For young people in this study, a more equitable relationship among peers - illustrated by
participants willingness to talk more openly - meant that controversial issues such as homosexuality or pornography could be brought up more easily for discussion, as well as providing space for young people to talk about their own and others' experiences.
On the topic of the first sex experiences, results of this study reveal that in stark contrast to the way in which participants spoke about sex, narratives of participants' first sex experiences exposed some heterosexual activity as coercive and violent. This issue was identified across all generations of participants. From participants' accounts of those experiences two themes emerged, these were self- blame, in other words, women look to be raped, and the normalisation of coercive sex. Self-blame was identified in the accounts of older as well as younger participants. However, the normalisation of coercive sex was an issue raised among younger participants who appeared to be resigned to the idea that coercion is a 'normal' part of a relationship with a man. None of the participants in this study, regardless of their age, talked about their experiences of violent or coercive sex with a parent.
On the issue of parent-adolescent talk, the results revealed that in the past parents were not expected to educate their adolescent children about sex and sexuality related issues, but that with the advent of the contraceptive pill and the opportunity it presented to young women to take responsibility for avoiding unintended pregnancy, meant that parents were increasingly expected to offer that
information to their daughters. However, results also show that many contemporary parents still do not condone their adolescent daughters becoming sexually active, and this mediates the way in which they engage with their daughters on the subject of sex. Thus, while there may be a trend toward greater parent-adolescent sexuality talk it appears that talk on that topic is primarily focused on risks and the need to avoid those risks through abstinence. The finding that contemporary parents' are primarily concerned about the risk of pregnancy and the need to regulate their adolescent daughters' activity in order to control for that, is out of line with the some of the 'real' issues young women are faced with.
A central feature of the results of this study was that participants talk on the topic of sex was framed by normative ideals - social and cultural values and beliefs about doing and appropriate doing. In Activity Theory normative ideals can be thought of as the 'rules' within an activity system. The discussion of the results will therefore be framed in terms of the rules mediating sexuality talk among adolescents, their parents and peers, within this community.
C H A P T E R F O U R
Discussion
In this study, social and cultural factors mediating sexuality talk were explored with a view to arguing that talk is mediated by the context in which it occurs. This was undertaken with a view to problematising simplistic forms of sexual health information dissemination. In this study the following questions were explored: which social and cultural factors mediate talk among peers;
which social and cultural factors mediate talk between parents and adolescents; and do social and cultural factors mediating talk change over time?
The results of this study indicate that normative ideals mediating individuals' behaviour in this community, also framed their talk on that topic. Normative ideals identified in the previous chapter include the framing of sex within the context of a relationship and values pertaining to relationships in this community which include heterosexuality, monogamy, and abstinence. Other normative ideals identified in the results include the expectation for parents to talk to their adolescent children about sex. In the process of that talk, it emerged that parents hold more 'traditional' and
conservative attitudes towards sex, compared with the attitudes of their adolescent children. Further to this, issues identified in peer talk highlighted an historical and limited acceptance of adolescent sexuality, and female sexuality in particular. As a result of the limited acceptance of adolescent sexuality, it emerged that peer talk has historically been, and remains, the primary opportunity for young people to learn about sex, and to talk about their own sex experiences. These issues are discussed in detail in this section.
In this discussion I intend to argue that parent-adolescent sexuality talk and peer sexuality talk are two different systems of activity. I will also be arguing that parents' and adolescents' competing motives for engaging in sexuality talk has the effect of silencing adolescents' talk about their experiences in the parent-adolescent communicative context. To facilitate this discussion,
diagrammatical representations of systems of talk based on Engestrom's (1987) model of the activity system for parents and adolescents will be presented. Each element within these systems will be discussed in order to elucidate what part it plays in mediating talk within that context, although
emphasis is placed on the rules of the system because that was the primary focus of the analysis.
Finally, themes arising in peer talk will be discussed as they relate to broader issues in contemporary South African research.