Note 167 — Chapter XIII · FAMILY INFLUENCES IN RELIGION

It is still to some extent a matter of dispute as to how far existing races of savages are ignorant of the rôle of the father in reproduction. There is much evidence in favour of such ignorance being often very considerable and sometimes perhaps complete (See E. S. Hartland, "Primitive Paternity," 1910). Some authors however (e. g. Walter Heape, "Sex Antagonism," and Carveth Read, "No Paternity," Jour. Royal Anthrop. Inst. 1918, XLVIII, 146) have maintained that the facts do not admit of the assumption of complete ignorance. Read especially has shown that such ignorance as exists may often be due to social or individual inhibitions, which prevent the knowledge of the true facts (a knowledge which exists in certain persons even in primitive communities) from penetrating to the consciousness of the majority of the inhabitants. If this view is correct, it reveals an interesting parallel to the fate of sexual knowledge in the individual; psycho-analytic investigation often showing that knowledge of the facts of sex and reproduction can be repressed from consciousness, though persisting in the unconscious levels of the mind. (Cp. Freud, "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex," 37 ff., 51.)