Quinceañera

Quinceañera (Spanish pronunciation: [kinseaˈɲeɾa]; feminine form of "fifteen-year-old"), also called fiesta de quince años, fiesta de quinceañera, quince años, quinceañero or simply quince, is a celebration of a girl's fifteenth birthday with cultural roots in Latin America but celebrated throughout the Americas. This birthday is celebrated differently from any other as it marks the transition from childhood to young womanhood. Latin myths and tradition tell about how girls were prepared for marriage by age fifteen or else they became nuns. In the years prior to their fifteenth birthdays, girls were taught to cook, weave, and about childbearing by the elder women in their communities in preparation for their expected lives as wives. The celebrations today vary significantly across countries; celebrations in some countries, for example, have taken on more religious overtones than in others.

In Brazil, a Portuguese-speaking country, the same celebration is called festa de debutantes, baile de debutantes or festa de quinze anos. In the French Caribbean and French Guiana, it is called fête des quinze ans. The grandest parties are comparable to the debutante balls formerly found in the United Kingdom and the United States. The quinceañera is celebrated according to their national traditions by many Latino communities in the United States.

In Spanish, "Quinceañera" literally means "Fifteen-year-old female". In English, primarily in the United States, the term is used (most often by non-Latinos) to refer to the celebration; this is not the case in Latin American countries, where only the girl, and never the celebration, is referred to as quinceañera.

Quinceañeras developed in Aztec culture in Mesoamerica around 500 B.C. At age fifteen, boys and girls were viewed as fathers and mothers of future warriors. Both sexes had rites of passage in this period of puberty, to take on adult responsibilities. A girl became a woman capable of bearing children. Over time, the quinceañera has continued to represent the physical and symbolic passage of a girl to a woman.

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