Nacirema Culture Essay

While his coworkers constructed his designs, what hobby did Bernini pursue? Answer Selected Answer: Correct Answer: Writing plays and designing stage sets Writing plays and designing stage sets

In the essay “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema”, anthropologist Horace Miner depicts a group of people known as the “Nacirema”, but is referring to Americans, whose cultural beliefs are deeply rooted in the perspective that the human body is prune to sickness and disfiguration. Consequently, a substantial part of their lives is spent on unusual rituals and customs to improve conditions of the body that are filled with magical components. Moreover, Miner uses the Nacirema’s unusual culture to establish his view that we simply could not judge another culture that it is different from our own, as opposed to another anthropologist Malinowski’s point that we can judge another culture since we are

The article then describes the community temple believed to help the extremely sick, which an individual can only enter after offering a rich gift to the custodian. Once inside of the temple, an individual undergoes a series of painful and humiliating rituals believed to cure human sickness and possession. According to the article, if an individual survives the temple ritual, he or she then must offer another great gift before return home. Finally, the article detail taboo associations with sex, pregnancy, and human excrement, and describes how individuals hide these taboos from the community.

In our society today, culture is not what it used to be hundreds of years ago. There is no more “pure” culture. Our culture today is enriched with many different traditions and customs that are being shared and adopted. Due to emigration and immigration, a variety of diverse customs, beliefs, and knowledge moved with every exiting and entering human being. Thus, changing and shaping the culture of many. Throughout the world, the beliefs and religious views of culture are dissimilar around the world. By taking the time to read, listen and learn about certain people’s culture, there will be knowledge and understanding that will be gained.

1. Ben Franklin, pointing to the sun carved on the back of the presiding officer's chair, remarked; "Throughout the days we have been laboring here, I have observed that sun, and wondered whether it was a rising sun or a setting sun. Now I know it was a rising sun."1 Throughout our lives we have been told of how our country was formed. I am here to tell you about the things the history books and teachers don’t tell you about the freemasons and there shaping of the United States of America. We will start with freemasons an agency that has been shaping history since the building of King Solomon’s temple.

The term Anthropology refers to the study of mankind as a whole. In the article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, the introduction of a new cultural perspective crosses the boundaries of today’s societal norms. Horace Miner is mainly known for his studies in mankind, and as an anthropologist he must take into consideration, without preconceived opinions the variety of unique cultures within the human race. The Nacirema is a group living in North America whose culture, through the perspective of Horace Miner showcases human behavior taken to its highest degree. There is a common belief among the people of Nacirema in which it is the human body is prone to weakness and disease; therefore, in becoming the focal point of the

Long before the coming of the so-called "civilized" Europeans, North America was inhabited by traveling bands of ancient people. Nomadic tribes, these early ancestors of Southwest Native Americans traveled the land in search of food from the thriving herds of large animals. But possibly as early as A.D. 900, as the wandering herds began to diminish, these people began to settle down and developed societies and cultures around what is called the Four Corners area of the southwest, in southern Utah and Colorado, and northern Arizona and New Mexico.

These rituals are preformed either in private or headed by a Medicine man, a spiritual leader, at shrines in houses equipped with many charms, powders, and herbs. Personal rites can be relatively harmless though the men and woman partake in a bit of the extreme. Men will frequently scrap at and lacerate their face with sharp instruments and woman will bake their heads in ovens based on the phases of the moon. Also, the Nacirema partake in mouth-rites wherein once or twice a year, they would visit a medicine man and the medicine men would use their sets of augers, probes, and prods to expand or create holes in the teeth to be filled with magical materials. These are all what equate to ritual torture and self mutilation. These people willingly take part in these rites that provide them with nothing but pain and from the outside looking in, seems like a largely masochistic people that has developed or elected sadistic specialists. This is all the more shocking when considering how large a part of their culture rituals are. In the book it is mentions how the children of this tribe sometimes denounce these rituals and especially the head temple of the medicine men, the Latipso, because it is where “people go to die.” It says they believe this because they are not yet indoctrinated in this culture, with the word

Every culture has their own practices that are seemingly foreign to other cultures that come after them. For example, we cannot judge the culture of Chinese people today in present day China as we judged the culture of the people who used to settle in the same country. The only thing that they share is location because history, technology, and religion have influenced modern cultures in ways that would have been completely foreign to ancestors of the same place. An example of this comes from Ruth Benedict in her essay The Pueblos of New Mexico. In this essay she describes that Indians who used to live in New Mexico. They were very different from the people that live there today. They were very relaxed in many ways of their culture expect religion.

For us to properly learn about culture, we must understand the meaning of cultural relativism and ethnocentrism. The two concepts challenge one another. Reading the article, we must pull away from our ethnocentric views and think critically about the Nacirema people's. However, the description of the culture creates an ideology that is hard to agree with. For example, the Nacirema peoples take part in a rite that involves hog hairs and magical powders. The Nacirema rituals do sound strange and displeasing but, we have to learn to recognize our ethnocentric judgments.

Indigenous religions exist in every climate around the world and exhibit a wide range of differences in their stories, language, customs, and views of the afterlife. Within indigenous communities, religion, social behavior, art, and music are so intertwined that their religion is a significant part of their culture and virtually inseparable from it. These religions originally developed and thrived in isolation from one another and are some of the earliest examples of religious practice and belief. The modern world; however, has taken its toll on these groups and many of their stories, customs, and beliefs have been lost to, or replaced by, those brought in as a result of popular culture and the missionary work of Christians and Muslims.

People are a very important part of their lifestyles. There are no abandoned people in the culture, everyone is taken in and is cared for. There is a great importance placed on family bonds although there are not as many extended families as there used to be, due to

Engai had three children, and he gave each a gift. The first child received and arrow to make his living by hunting, the second a hoe to dig the land and grow crops, and the third a stick to use in herding cattle. And the third son, whose name was Natero Kop, was the father of the Massai. I just find it crazy how these certain cultures can come up with stories, theories or whatever it is they are coming up with. And to believe that they entrusted all their faith and never were led astray from their religion, makes me develop a strong respect for their culture.

When understanding the many beliefs that cultures have, helps grasp an understanding the healing practices a family may have. In today’s society, “religious practices are usually rooted in culture” (Giger and Davidhizas, 2008). Typically each culture has a set of beliefs that they use to explain their health and manners that prevent or treat illnesses and diseases. When a family member is ill, a culture uses rituals to get rid of the disease.

Madura is an island that located in the northeast of East Java. Madura island is composed of four districts, namely: Bangkalan, Sampang, Pamekasan, and Sumenep. Besides that, a lot of Netherlanders who do research on this Island. Then the Netherlanders introduce a colonial stereotype of Madurese to the others, such as strong, mighty, unheavy-arm, crude, unmannerly and so on. On the contrary, Madurese have unique cultural diversity, and stereotypical. The typical terms in here are indicating that the ethnic Madurese entity has a specificity-cultural that is not similar with the other community ethnography. Every culture that exists in Madura is identical of “gotong royong” and connecting