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5 - Sex and uncertainty

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2009

James S. Chisholm
Affiliation:
University of Western Australia, Perth
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Summary

I can't even imagine what you mean when you ask about being a teenager. In this neighborhood boys grow up to be men before they are five. There is no such thing as being a teenager. You're a child, then a man, and then you die.

Stephen, 19-year-old father in a high-risk neighborhood in a large US city (Burton 1997:211)

I mean we don't have no money so we make up for it with women. I mean if you going to come into a hundred thousand dollars, you going to make it. Your friends be envying you. Now, if you don't got nothing, but you going to have five women, you going to be self-satisfied. It's just a thing we do. But if you have money, you don't have to be defined through women.

Eddie, resident of a high-risk neighborhood in a large US city (Bourgois 1995:291)

I love kids. I believe kids are the most wonderful things alive; that's what made me live until now. Because … you know how you love a mother? You can never love a mother more until you have a baby. I loved my mother more when I had my first daughter; that's when I loved my mother more. Because when a baby is born … when you see a baby … and you see it so small, you say, that baby can't come and smack you, and say, “Mommy, don't do this; don't do that.” […]

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Chapter
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Death, Hope and Sex
Steps to an Evolutionary Ecology of Mind and Morality
, pp. 149 - 202
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1999

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  • Sex and uncertainty
  • James S. Chisholm, University of Western Australia, Perth
  • Book: Death, Hope and Sex
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511605932.006
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  • Sex and uncertainty
  • James S. Chisholm, University of Western Australia, Perth
  • Book: Death, Hope and Sex
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511605932.006
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Sex and uncertainty
  • James S. Chisholm, University of Western Australia, Perth
  • Book: Death, Hope and Sex
  • Online publication: 02 December 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511605932.006
Available formats
×