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The other reading was an article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, after reading the article, I realize that it was specifically referring to the American culture in a strange way like for example the latipso temple is a hospital, medicine men are doctors, laceration of the face is simply shaving, women baking heads in small ovens is simply going to the salon and putting their heads under the hair dryers and other things that you can relate to our culture.…
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In Body Ritual Among the Nacirema, Horace Miner writes about the strange rituals that people do in America. While reading the story I was almost fooled, but as read further I realized the spoof of Nacirema; Nacirema is American spelled backwards and the references in the myth are the backward strange American everyday rituals. Miner’s word usage made it obvious it was just a myth, words like magical, fascination, bewitched, and mythology gave it away. Miner portrays Americans as a tribe that go through their daily life by performing painful and needed rituals to their bodies. It is not obvious at the beginning of the case study that the tribe Miner is talking about is American people. The rituals they perform mainly focus on the human body, and if Americans skip these rituals we will have a nasty society of individuals. (Miner disguises the bathroom as a cleaning shrine, the medicine chest as the major device in the shrine and the hair on a stick as a toothbrush. He describes the shrine as a private and secret place where cleansing and makeup rituals take place. The box and the chest have charms and potions from the medicine men). Harvey, C & Allard, J (2005) Understanding and Managing Diversity: readings, cases and exercises Pearson Prentice Hall 4th edition p.19…
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The first thing I noticed about the article, Body Ritual Among the Nacirema by Horace Miner is that Nacirema is American spelled backwards. That caught my attention right away and I thought to myself how interesting. Then as I started reading further into the article, I realized that the Nacirema people are us. What I found most interesting about the Nacirema people is how obsessed and focused we are on our health and body. There is always a fad diet that guarantees amazing results or a new cross fit workout that will mold our body like those on American Ninja Warrior. I was bothered by the statement that said “the fundamental belief underlying the whole system appears to be that the human body is ugly and that its natural tendency is to debility and disease” (McCutheon, 1). After I read this sentence…
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“The Body Ritual” was written in 1956, a time when people’s basic understanding of different culture was insufficient. (Hyung Kim, 2012) The article focuses on the Nacirema and the strange beliefs and superstitions that happen within their culture. If someone is reading this for the first time they may not catch on to Miner’s satirical delivery and unknowingly assume the Nacirema is a Native American tribe. “Instead Miner was talking about common behaviors of Americans that he turned into supernatural and magical rituals. What this actually shows is how language can shape the reader’s impression of a culture in a way that causes people to understand in a totally different perspective.” (Hyung Kim). Miner tricked people into thinking that everyday people, places, and things were a part of a foreign culture. For example; calling bathrooms “shrines”, Doctors “medicine men”, pharmacists “herbalists”, hospitals “latipsohs” and thermometers “magic wands in the supplicants mouths.” (Miner, 1956)…
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Broadly speaking, Horace Miner, the author of “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema”, criticizes Nacirema’s uncivilized culture. In the article, Miner describes how the tribes perform the strange sadism rituals to very extreme level. The holy-mouth-man uses a variety of tool to enlarge the client’s mouth and put magical materials into the holes. What makes Miner more uncomfortable is that women even bake their head in small ovens for an hour. He thinks that “the magical beliefs and practices of Nacirema present such unusual aspects that it seems desirable to describe them as an example of the extremes to which human behavior can go.” And Miner calls the Nacirema a masochistic and magic-ridden people.…
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One of the fundamental beliefs of the Nacirema is that “the human body is ugly and that its natural tendency is to debility and disease.” According to the Christian tradition, the human body is fallen and is therefore prone to disease and weakness; so in that respect, I do not completely disagree with the Nacirema. However, they seem to take the ugliness of the body to a whole new extreme. Their fascination with the mouth is extremely interesting. In today’s society we don’t necessarily see the mouth as an evil device, but more as a tool for communication and sexuality. The relationship between oral and moral characteristics is an interesting way to see the world. I had a lot of cavities before the age of 16, and I can honestly say that I wasn’t an overly evil child; it’s just a byproduct of not brushing and too much sugar. The Nacirema seem to read a lot into things that are just repercussions of a life lived.…
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The first problem is that religious beliefs can lead to unnecessary pain. Nurse Nancy is the God mother of Mrs. Johnson. She works in the oncology unit, and she knows how much pain the patient’s have to endure. Pain is the primary assessment that has to be under control in order to keep the patient comfortable. Medication is the primary way that the oncology unit control’s the patient’s pain. Some patient’s religious beliefs can influence the choice of taking the medications; because of diet restriction and the by-product of the medicine.…
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Many of the practices Miner mentions in the article aren’t really strange to the Nacirema culture. But an outsider views the practices as odd. For example, Miner mentions about a shrine box, which translate to a medicine cabinet being strange to the outsider. The charms and magical potions in the shrine box being the medicine needed cure the ills and maladies of an individual. Medicine had a purpose of curing those maladies for many with similar ills. But the outsider views pulling out these magical packets is not something done in their culture or rather not seen as necessary. These charms and magical potions are given to the people by the medicine men, or rather doctors, psychiatrists, and pharmacists. Another strange practice to the outsider is the belief in the…
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Over 50 years ago, Horace Miner published a study on the Nacirema Tribe. In the study he talked about their body rituals, and revealed to the world every strange ritual these people had. After reading this study, I decided to do one for myself. So I visited the Nacirema tribe. The things I observed still puzzles me.…
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To most of us, hospitals are a place to help you when you’re in need or want to get healthy. But for the Nacirema, it’s quite the opposite. According to the Nacirema ritual article, they call hospitals a latipso, which is hospital spelt backwards without the ‘H’. They discuss and caricature the repulsive viewings on what they think goes on in hospitals (latipso’s), or what they think they do. I will now tell you how in Miner’s perspective, the body is ugly and how the body is dirty.…
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Horace Miner in his writing of the article, Body Ritual Among the Nacirema present a situation where the society in the world has abandoned their natural tendencies to adopt modernity. At one point, the society is seen to maintain its natural stature; but on the other side is seen to adopt new ways of keeping the body pure and good; for example, believing in the powers of medicine and holy water from the church.…
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I could only imagine how Horace Miner felt when entering the Nacirema village. At first glance he must have had culture shock when learning about the daily mouth cleansing and the temples where some enter and never return. I came to realize that western cultures share many of the same daily rituals just like the Nacirema. This non-material culture has many reglionist beliefs such has the use of witch doctors, medicine men, shrines and oddly enough the Nacirema woman bake their heads in oven. In evaluating the culture of the Nacirema we can break down each of the beliefs and compare them to…
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The Nacirema tribe has many strange rituals in regards to the cleanliness or beauty of the body. They believe the human body is ugly and debilitating. Everything they do is in response to that thought process. They spend a large portion of their day in rituals to cleanse their body. They go to medicine men or witch doctors in order to perfect their body. One such horrific ritual is that they go to a medicine man that performs the decorative body rite.…
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I like your take on what our cultures equivalent of a latipso is. It made me look at the institution from a different point of view. People could be having their spiritual ailments healed and there is almost always a Christian church in every town. I viewed it as a place to treat physical ailments much like a modern day hospital.…
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Miner tells us that the Nacirema are “a North American group living in the territory between the Canadian Cree, the Yaqui and Tarahumare of Mexico, and the Carib and Arawak of the Antilles.” They have a “highly developed market economy”, but appearance seems to take command of their peoples’ priorities. The fundamental belief of the Nacirema people is that “the human body is ugly and that its natural tendency is to debility and disease”, so they do all these unusual rituals to try to keep their bodies healthy and good-looking.…
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