Horace Miner's 'Body Ritual Among The Nacirema'

Asia Ore

Aryn Bradley

EH 101-125

February 25, 2016 Horace Miner was an American Anthropologist at the University of Michigan but was known worldwide for his work. In his lifetime, he has published several books including Agriculture in 1949 and City in Modern Africa in 1967. But, Miner was best known for his satirical, anthropology analysis known as the “Body Ritual among the Nacirema”. Anthropology is the study of humans, past and present. That analysis was based on a study of a race that was located between the Canadian Cree and the Yaqui and Tarahumare of Mexico. It contains the everyday lives of how these people live and the “rituals” they partake in. Several of these rituals these people partake in can come across as strange and or weird

Miner standpoint was to define the culture as how we act. In today’s society, anybody that reads this article would most definitely think that the obsessions of the Nacirema culture is strange to can Americans eye. It concludes more about the foundation of the anthropology than the foundation of the Americans. Miner mentioned a lot of accurate points about the Americans. That was gravitated toward religious beliefs and how these people interacted with these beliefs. Throughout the article, he explained certain things that the Nacirema or Americans do to live in this world. When I first began to read the article, I was appalled about the weird doings of this North American culture. As I continued to read, and introduced to the “holy mouth men” that I started to come to realization that I started comparing to my own culture. I started to compare and contrast what was being said and what I personally do on the everyday basis. Miner wrote this article to portray that he was not talking about Americans but indeed he was. It seemed like he made fun of what we did as a whole. To our behavior to where we go when we had

Miner was very articulate with the words he used to describe this certain culture. He describes the culture in a way where other will not think they are being talked about. Or in a way made fun of. I feel that the discussion of the Nacirema was very interesting. The ones that participated in the analysis must have had an ultimate culture reality check. Because the doings that were discussed in the article were everyday American things but to other cultures it may be extremely bizarre. I concluded that Miner mindset of putting together this analysis was to demonstrate how other people see other societies and how judgmental people can be. It shows how societies think about other societies. But also puts it into terms where the naked eye would see straight through. He made decent points throughout the entire analysis. In conclusion, it comes clear that there are differences when it comes to cultures. But also could be the same in a way. There are some cultures and communities that have high expectations that may seem somewhat unimportant or different from people that does not share the same beliefs. As a result, it may be cool to have knowledge on another society so we can understand their beliefs and learn to except them. Even though times have changed and still changing, certain things and beliefs and doings will