Thesis Statement
Discovering America’s diversity and/ or ethnocentrism through the use of sociological imagination while exploring the body rituals and customs used by Nacirema (American) Tribes.
Introduction
Anthropologists strive every day to employ culturally relative methods to their research, and have made great strides in the understanding of foreign cultures and societies. We must also, however, notice that these ethnocentric interpretations are sometimes more accurate than we can imagine. Cultural relativism is crucial to our understanding of unknown people and cultures. Without it, we are subject to misinterpretation and incorrect assumptions, which is exactly what Miner was trying to tell us. Being able to subjectively take a step back from the safety and comfort of our own well placed and overtly understood glass houses, while acknowledging that to know another culture requires a full understanding of that cultures beliefs and motivations. Given our normal every day rituals, we interpret what we do or say as the truth, despite the fact the different people have different cultures binding and guiding them as their norms. Therefore, the diversity can be just as surprising for the outsider, as perhaps it is for us at times. The author (Minor, 1956) details his script while using qualitative research methodology of the Nacierma (American) people and their explicit body rituals and beliefs through humorous observations and cleverly defined language defaults. He thoughtfully defines our ideologies with our economic pursuits, along with our stronger sense of development with the improper self -diagnosed images, known as our bodies, appearances and the American way of living. We as Americans, a unique cultural group, can be viewed by many others as being extreme or bias in our own self impressions, beliefs, and even undefinable naturally committed customs. Most of the Nacirema (American) people focus their lives on economic pursuits and their body rituals. Therefore, they are hardworking people, and this behavior is not uncommon, mostly because it is practiced by various cultural groups throughout the world, including ourselves. Nacirema (American) people tend to focus mainly concentrate on body rituals (Miner, 1956). From these values, it is clear that these people have strong cultural values. This ritual does not cause cultural relativism since these beliefs apply in any other cultural contexts. However, the philosophy and aspects of the ceremonies are unique to this cultural group. They are the aspects that cause the group to be interesting to the people who try to study them. Their intensity also causes the understanding of their culture by other people to be difficult. Most of their belief and focus is the nature, or “sin” of nature being constricted to a body full of disease and unpredictability. The body is foreseen as ugly, with no value, and penetrated with unhealthy characteristics within their normal standards. The only imaginable hope is to rid the body of such unpleasantness though powerful, and sometimes painful, rigorous daily rituals and customs. Some of these rituals involve a shrine located within the home built from wattle and daub construction, although the room that holds the shrine is often made up from stone. The rituals themselves that occur within the shrine, are not family rituals shared amongst each other. In the shrines, natives have built chest or box on the walls which has charms and magical potions and pure water which is the main thing in the hall temple.
Nacirema (American) people believe that there is a supernatural influence in all social relationships and a strong relationship exists between oral and moral characteristics, but their strongest believe is the medicine man who writes down the ingredient of the medicine in a secret language that only he would understand it. They believe that without it they could not be alive. The medicine man has both the
