Jul 26, · The “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, is an article that examines the various rituals that manifests within industrialized societies, specifically referencing to the United States. In the article Miner joked about the invasion of privacy and the obsession of becoming blogger.comted Reading Time: 5 mins To conclude, the article “Body Rituals of the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, provides the insight that different points of view will provide different answers. Depending on one’s view of the Holy Mouth men, the Shrines, and the practices that the Nacirema use, it may seem very peculiar or very normal “Body Rituals Among the Nacirema, “ by Horace Miner, is an essay written about the Nacirema, or American people, from an outsider’s perspective. Miner gives an insight on the Nacireman people, which he describes in his essay as an unknown tribe, and the completing of the Nacireman’s magical beliefs and practices, which involve daily, involuntary body rituals that cause much pain and discomfort
Horace Miner’s Body Ritual Among the Nacirema Essay | Bartleby
The Nacirema are an unusual North American culture. For example, every house of the Nacirema people has one or more shrines, where its sole purpose is to purify the human body of debility and disease.
The article has many examples of how the Nacirema go to great lengths to keep their bodies up to a high standard within their respective communities. The shrines are bathrooms, and the holy mouth men are dentists. But if we embed ourselves into a culture and look at it from the point of view of the natives, even the strangest body ritual among the nacirema essays will seem acceptable or reasonable. Miner uses various examples to show that different points of view will provide different answers, body ritual among the nacirema essays.
Reading this from a subjective, western point of view, one might find these practices and ideals very unorthodox or even label them as primitive.
On the other hand, if one was to be able to look at a culture from the view of a native, one would see that the holy mouth men are simply dentists, and the intense rituals that they perform are just everyday procedures dentists do.
This is a great example of how if we embed ourselves into a culture, body ritual among the nacirema essays, we will be able to see how similar it is to our own. A second key example used by Miner was the shrines. Miner explains that to avoid debility and disease, the Nacirema use powerful influences through rituals and ceremonies and that every household has at least one shrine dedicated to this purpose.
Hearing that these villages use ceremonies and rituals to rid themselves of disease can sound like an exorcism-typed process to a western person. It is quite the opposite because these shrines are not magical, but they represent the bathrooms in American culture. Reflecting on the Nacirema from a distanced point of view provides a very small, and untrue idea of how the society and culture of the Nacirema functions. Both the holy mouth men and the shrines are excellent examples of how perspective can shape your ideas about culture, body ritual among the nacirema essays.
The article has mentions ethnocentrism, ethnocentric fallacy, and cultural relativism. As a reader, the first experience with the article would make the Nacirema look extremely unordinary and irregular, body ritual among the nacirema essays. If the article is read from a western point of view with western cultural ideals, the idea of the medicine men and the holy mouth men would seem completely insane.
Similarly, the article may also demonstrate an ethnocentric fallacy. It can be assumed that ethnocentric fallacy is inevitable based on the fact that if you were to give this article to a modern American, they might get offended or mad.
They may think that their culture is nothing like how Miner describes it and they may argue that it fails to account for factors that people deal with throughout their day-to-day lives, body ritual among the nacirema essays. In addition to ethnocentrism and ethnocentric fallacy, the article has references to cultural relativism. Cultural relativism is the attempt to understand the beliefs and behaviors of other cultures in terms of the culture in which they are found.
As stated above, the main message of the article is if we embed ourselves into a culture and look at it from the point of view of the natives, even the strangest rituals will seem acceptable or reasonable. This is proven by the fact that it is nearly impossible to see that the Nacirema culture is the American culture without fully embedding ourselves into that community and looking at the whole society from the point of view of a Nacirema.
Through the reading, many questions arose. The article infers that cultural relativism is the best way to examine another culture. It is known from a lecture body ritual among the nacirema essays cultural relativism can cause some problems. For example, it says that behaviors cannot be condemned, and it allows any and everything. There are problems with both ethnocentrism and cultural relativism, so what is the best way to examine a culture?
Furthermore, it was confusing as to why Miner never explicitly stated that the article was about American culture. That was required by the reader to find out on their own.
Could Miner have not added a section after the main article explaining the Nacirema being American society and why he chose such a distant view of the American people?
The last question that arose was, who gets to represent people in the media and why do they get to? What qualifies them? Why is Miner allowed to write about the American culture and what makes it okay to use such an alienated point of view, only to make the whole article a satire? This essay has been submitted by a student. This is not an example of the work written by our professional essay writers. You can order our professional work here. We use cookies to offer you the best experience.
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Body Ritual among the Nacirema
, time: 11:26Body Ritual Among the Nacirema Free Essay Sample
‘Body Ritual among the Nacirema’ is an article by Horace Miner that generally focuses on how different body attitudes of different persons have different impacts on the societal institution. His core objective in this article is to show the reader how other cultures may view the American culture from blogger.comted Reading Time: 8 mins “Body Rituals Among the Nacirema, “ by Horace Miner, is an essay written about the Nacirema, or American people, from an outsider’s perspective. Miner gives an insight on the Nacireman people, which he describes in his essay as an unknown tribe, and the completing of the Nacireman’s magical beliefs and practices, which involve daily, involuntary body rituals that cause much pain and discomfort To conclude, the article “Body Rituals of the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, provides the insight that different points of view will provide different answers. Depending on one’s view of the Holy Mouth men, the Shrines, and the practices that the Nacirema use, it may seem very peculiar or very normal
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