A goddess-mother's responsibility is to safeguard her pubescent daughter and deliver her safely to marriage.

In a Dumuzi-Inanna courtship song, when Dumuzi urges Inanna to frolic with him in the moonlight, Inanna replies, "What lies should I tell my mother?"

She does not intend to reject Dumuzi, for when he declares himself ready to come to the gate of her mother to ask for her in marriage, Inanna is overjoyed.

She preserves her virginity until her wedding.
Inanna is known in Sumerian literature as goddess of sexual attractivenesss and desire.
Nevertheless, when she appears in her aspect of the young sexually desirable girl, she is a sexual innocent:

I am one who knows not that which is womanly -- copulating,
I am one who knows not that which is womanly -- kissing,
I am one who knows not copulating,
I am one who knows not kissing.

When we consider Inanna's function in the provision of fertility and abundance, it might appear unusual that she looks to Dumuzi for food.
Inanna prepares for her wedding by washing herself, anointing herself with oil, putting on eyeliner, dressing her hair, and putting on jewelry.

Dumuzi, for his part, promises to bring the food she desires.
The sense of husband as provider of food is found in the lament for the dead Dumuzi in which Inanna mourns the loss of her provider,
"the one who gave me food will no longer give me food; the one who gave me water will no longer give me water."

Yet Inanna is not domesticated. She does not weave, cook, or perform "wifely" duties.
In her lack of encumbrances, she lives the life of young men.
Like them she is called "manly.."
Like them she loves warfare and seeks lovers.
She is a woman in a man's life.

Thus, unlike other women, she is placed at the boundary of differences between man and woman. She transcends gender polarities, and is said to turn men into women and women into men.

The cult of Inanna represents this role of boundary-keeper of the gender line. At her festivals men dress as women and women as men, and cultic dancers wear costumes that are male on the right and female on the left.

In this cultic gender mix and in its hymnic acknowledgement, Ishtar serves not only to transcend gender, but ultimately to protect it.

As in all ritualized rebellion, the societally approved and regulated breaking of a norm actually serves to reinforce it.