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Amish Rumspringa

Updated: Nov 22, 2018

Amish community ideals and morals originate from those of Anabaptist Christians (Mazie, 2005, p. 748). They value simplicity, modesty, family life, hard work and religion, and refuse technology and modern comforts such as cars and electricity (p. 749). The Amish also emphasize the importance of “communal aid and reciprocal good” (p. 749).


Contemporary understandings of the Amish and their rite of passage, rumspringa, come from reality TV shows and movie portrayals that gained popularity in the early 2010’s. However, these portrayals only depict a small portion of rumspringa experiences, and are also edited to create drama in order to attract audiences.



Rumpringa, “the running around” period (Mazie, 2005, p. 745), is an Amish rite of passage for adolescences around age 16 that allows them to experience the world outside of their community without condemnation. It lasts as many years as it takes for the Amish youth to decide whether they want to be baptized and accept their role within the community or to leave the community.


Around 90% of youth return after rumspringa (Mazie, 2005, p. 752), but the Amish population in the United States is only an estimate of 200,000 people (Shachtman, 2006, p. 25).


The Amish do not baptize their babies when they are born because they believe that only adults have the ability to “consciously and legitimately choose to enter the church” (Mazie, 2005, p. 748). Joining the community is by “voluntary membership” (p. 745), and “no one is baptized against [their] will” (p. 749).


However, this is contested by many outsiders as non-Amish life is depicted as materialist, consumerist, and filled with drugs, alcohol, sex and parties to Amish youth (Mazie, 2005, p. 752). This offers a very limited view of what life outside of the community can be (p. 752). With only a few reference points for the outside world, Amish youth are ill-informed on the opportunities that it can provided and thus are arguably participating in uninformed consent (p. 752).


Leaving the community is also difficult as Amish children are only educated to an eighth grade level and most well paying jobs require a minimum of a high school graduation (Mazie, 2005, p. 752). Furthermore, Amish youth have little opportunities to create connections in the outside world which are necessary if they are to become successful.


In addition, once one decides to stay in the community, they belong to the community forever. If one joins the community then later decides to leave, they will be shunned. There is no option to be both Amish and experience the modern world at the same time (Mazie, 2005, p. 753).


Amish youth riding horse-drawn buggies.

Most Amish youth continue to live at home even when they are participating in rumspringa. Some party on the weekends in remote locations while others just occasionally go bowling which is generally dependent on the location of the community and what group the youth belongs to. Those who do party often emulate the hegemonic masculinity that they associate with the party culture of the non-Amish world.


Band hops are parties that take place in a secluded area, and provide space for Amish youth to drink, smoke, listening to music and dance (Stevick, 2014, p. 188). In the one described by Stevick, males outnumbered females three to one (p. 189). In these masculine dominated spaces, Amish boys talked about cars, drugs and girls (p. 190).


The emulating of hegemonic masculinity is further displayed as one girl reveals in an interview that she only ever goes to parties when invited by boys (Shachtman, 2006, p. 16), and feels uncomfortable asking for a beer because she associates asking for a beer with asking for sex (p. 17). It has also been reported that fights occasionally break out at band hops (Stevick, 2014, p. 190).


The way that some Amish boys participate in rumspringa mirrors Westernized hegemonic masculinity as party spaces tend to be dominated by males who are drinking, smoking and doing drugs. As a result, some girls do not go out unless invited by boys and when they do go out, they are hyperaware of risks when interacting with boys.


While rumspringa does not read nearly as bad as fraternities on university campuses, the same vibe of toxic masculinity is given. However, the party atmosphere is not something that all Amish youth experience.


For more information on Rumspringa, click here.


References:

Shachtman, T. (2006). Rumspringa. New York, NY: North Point Press.


Mazie, S. V. (2005). Consenting adults? Amish rumspringa and the quandary of exit in liberalism. Perspectives on Politics, 3(4), p. 745-259. doi: 10.1017/S1537592705050425


Stevick, R. A. (2014). Rumspringa: Stepping out and running about. In Growing Up Amish: The Rumspringa Years (pp. 175-210). Baltimore, Maryland: John Hopkins University Press.

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