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General comparative characteristics of culture in the usa and india
Native american culture and traditions
Native american culture and traditions
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After reading “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema” I believe the Nacirema are the Americans. First Nacirema is American spelled backwards. I also think it is America because it said “North American group living… Little is known of their origin, al- though tradition states that they came from the east.”
Body Ritual of the Nacirema by Horace Miner is a clever piece that describes a foreign sounding culture only to be realized that the group being described is one that is much more familiar. Through his process of describing conventional habits or “rituals” in an unconventional way, he allows the reader to look at this culture through a very unique lens. The Nacirema are the Americans and a representation of the American culture. Although this might not be immediately apparent to the reader, there are a number of hints throughout the text to help come to this realization.
Josie Appleton’s piece opens with her introducing the fact that body modification has lost its mark of being taboo. Appleton then transitions into describing the different kinds of people that modify their bodies and why they do it. The fact that people used to mostly use tattoos to identify with a group and are now using them to define themselves is heavily enforced. The rest of the piece describes in great detail the different ways people use piercings and tattoos to better understand themselves and mark important milestones. The piece concludes with Appleton claiming that body modification should only be for fashion, because bringing significance to it causes problems.
Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice by Mark J. Plotkin PhD Tales of a Shaman’s Apprentice chronicles the interesting journey of the Harvard graduate and ethnobiologist Mark J. Plotkin as he attempts to record what’s left of the slowly dying art of shamanism and traditional medicine, particularly in the northern part of South Africa. The book does an excellent job of relating important medicinal discoveries to their origins in nature and traditional medicine. In this way, the book cleverly mixes the subject of medicine and history in a way that I believe will be interesting for pharmacy students. Throughout my reading of the book, I enjoyed how it felt as though I as the reader got to go on this journey with him to all these interesting locations
Body Ritual among the Nacirema was written by Horace Miner in 1956. This piece was crafted as an excellent accumulation of the techniques of ironic, symbolism and use of a didactic tone that made this piece a great success. An example of where irony is used in the text is the way he makes us see the tribe as foreign and exotic and we judge it, but then we realize that Nacirema is American spelled backwards and the reader see that it is not a foreign tribe - but indeed the modern American people themselves. There is also mass irony around Notgnihsaw and the chopping down of the cherry tree in which the Spirit of Truth resided, because Notgnihsaw spelled backwards is Washington. Miner is using irony because America is supposed to be built on
The Mongol invasion on Baghdad could possibly be thought of as a critical moment in world history. The Mongols left a cavernous trauma on all parts of the Muslim world. It made the population drop significantly, they were left with no leader,it ruined the central points of Islamic civilization, and all of their major buildings and markets were destroyed. Despite the difficulties that Baghdad and the Islamic world faced because of this attack, Islam still stood strong to continue to be a major world religion. One of the major effects was the population drop.
• This book is about finding medicinal plants in the Amazon Rainforest to cure common diseases. • Sometimes, Western medicines cannot cure the common diseases. • This book was written by Mark Plotkin and it was published in 1993. • Mark Plotkin travels to different parts of the rainforest and collect several medicinal plants for a research experiment. •
Through partaking in interaction rituals, individuals become members of something greater than themselves. This feeling of being apart of something greater than oneself provides a moral community for the individuals, which then guides individuals in their beliefs and behaviors. It is similar to a never-ending circle; as individuals see the emotionally charged environment that this religion provides, they want to be a part of it, so they partake in unusual rituals, which furthers their engagement and emotional connectedness to their community. It almost reminds me a bit of an addiction. This community turns objects, such as poison and snakes as sacred, which in turn creates a sacred and profane world.
Horace Miner, a American Anthropologist wrote an academic essay titled “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema.” In this article Miner described some of the bizarre rituals and practices of the “Nacirema” which the reader comes to find out that he is talking about North Americans. The way Miner goes into detail about how these people live makes them seem foreign. Thus making the norm for an American lifestyle seem odd because the certain type of lingo Miner uses to make this “tribe” more exotic then the actually are. His point in doing this is to show the reader how obnoxious anthropologist can be when they are explain a different culture.
Horace Miner, the author of “Body Ritual among the Nacirema”, used very interesting and descriptive choice of words to describe the routines that modern Americans go through from an outsider point of view. He gives different terms to describe mundane routines, like brushing your teeth, and exaggerate the details as something that is bizarre. Some rituals Miner described as illogical because there was a low rate of success in what they are trying to achieve. This reveals that what determines something to be socially acceptable is not through logic, but only though the popularity of the community. One of the rituals that Miner described as illogical but everyone still do the ritual was the fact that the people kept going to the “holy-mouth-man”, or also known as the dentist, even if their teeth are still decaying.
The Navajo are a Native American tribe, whose reservation land spreads over 14,000 square miles. Their homes, food, tools, clothing, and culture are not the same as ours. Yet they still have their similarities and differences. The Navajos live in four states, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico.
This is a negative characteristic of a society. When too much attention is placed on physical looks, people begin to loose sight of what is really important and became superficial in their thinking and judging of others based on their appearance. Their main place of prayer takes place at a shrine. Shrine is the synonym for the bathroom. The chest built into wall is mirror, featuring medicine cabinet and other things we can’t imagine our daily life without.
Some of those rituals are avoiding exposure of their body and bathing in secret. They believe that the body is an ugly thing. In order to make it better they have to perform a ritual and ceremony. Many of their homes have multiple shrines dedicated to this purpose. The more powerful
The practice of modifying one’s skin as a means of expression has been active for as long as 5300 years (Haskings-Winner, Collichaw, Kritzer, & Warecki, 2011). However, in modern day societies the stigma against body modification, including tattoos is still prevalent. To understand why people of a North American influence would subject themselves to this potential undermining, one must first uncover what motivates a person to permanently enhance their skin. Primarily, research into the topic, history, traditions, modern meanings, was conducted using printed resources, online databases, and online-published journals. Notes and condensed summaries of said research was used to create survey questions and a general audience was decided.
Finally, this last example of Christian life story taken from the film is representing most of the Christians reasons on believing Jesus Christ. Newsboys, the band that is part of the cast of the movie asked by a reporter how they can believe that God and Jesus are real. They answered that they believed because it gives them hope. Just like many Christians’ reason why they still believed in God and Jesus Christ in spite of their hardships is because by believing, it gives them hopes in life and motivation that after all these circumstances, there is a reward that awaits them in the kingdom of God.
