Preview

Body Ritual Among The Nacirema Analysis

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
660 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Body Ritual Among The Nacirema Analysis
Nacirema
When I read Body Rituals Among the Nacirema by Horace Miner the first time, I couldn’t imagine how a culture could behave this way and live their daily lives following these rituals. They believed that their bodies were ugly and its natural tendency was to debility and disease. They devoted much of their time trying to prevent these characteristics
After observing the Nacirema customs, I found it to be crazy that they had shrines with a box or chest built into the wall full of magic potions. Medicine men prescribed these potions which they felt without they could not survive. In this shrine they performed all of their daily rituals in private. Miner explained the mouth rite each individual followed religiously on a daily basis

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    n the article, “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema” by Horace Miner, the author’s purpose is revealed through judgemental and magical word choice.…

    • 271 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In the article Body Ritual Among The Nacirema by Horace Miner, he makes fun of people’s weaknesses, mistakes, foolishness, and wrong behavior. He uses confusing vocabulary words to make it hard for use to know who the article is talking about. Miner refers Nacirema as to America. He wanted to make Nacirema seem magical and silly by describing them as born with behaviors. Miner also, believes that Nacierma do bizarra thing because he does not understand the meaning behind their behavior. One of the behavior is the belief in the ugliness of human body. In society, we are told what is pretty from what is ugly. This is determined by models, hairdressers, barber shop, spa, and infomercial. As a society, we have the power to decided what is right…

    • 195 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    In this paper I discuss what point Horace Miner was trying to make is his paper titled "Body Ritual among the Nacirema". Horace’s paper is about America but in the perspective that America is a tribe of third world country or such. I go through the individual topics, which mostly make fun of American’s vanity, and I describe what he is really talking about. I try to summaries Horace’s paper and put it in “American” terms.…

    • 1096 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    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 Arawark of the Antilles. Little is known about their origin but people believe that they came from the east. These people concentrate on the human body, which is their main concern which makes the Nacirema unique in their rituals and ways of thinking. The Nacirema believe that the human body is ugly in the sense that it’s not perfect because it’s weak and prone to catch diseases. They believe that the only way to rid of these characteristics is through rituals and ceremonies.…

    • 563 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    After reading the article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema”, I can’t help but notice blatantly obvious similarities between our culture and theirs. Their rituals, rites, and customs are bizarre in nature and seem to illustrate a nearly obsessive fascination with the human body. The main focus of their culture appears to be shaming people based on their appearance and forcing them to conform to the societal norms. Upon further reading, I noted that while the Nacirema put a high value on the upkeep of their bodies, they made it exorbitantly expensive to do so, even if a tribe member was dying of sickness and the supplies, or “potions”, were readily available to cure him/her. This seemed backwards. There are some aspects of the Nacirema culture…

    • 299 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The most interesting topic that was covered this quarter was in Week 2, Chapter 2: Culture and Society. This was also when the class read the article Body Ritual Among the Nacirema by Horace Miner. This whole week was so intriguing and diverse, one in particular term made a large impression on me, and this was “rituals” as explained by Barken (p. 36) This term and act initially brought a sense of familiarity among all cultures, ethnicity groups, and societies, because each one of us performs a ritual daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. These may vary from extreme acts, or conform to the social normality of going to the dentist every six months for a checkup. The mutual properties of this term is what I found to be the most interesting. From…

    • 335 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    According to, Professor Linton, who brought the ritual of the Nacirema to the attention of anthropologists twenty years ago, claims the culture of these people are very poorly understood (Miner, n.d.). Miner proceeds to give many representations in which the Naciremas people have beliefs and rituals…

    • 1092 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In “Body Ritual among the Nacirema” Miner writes about the rituals within a tribe. The tribe he talks about is America. Nacirema spelt backwards is America and it is located between Canada and Mexico. This article discusses about Americans and their everyday activities relating to their body and health. Although Miner’s analyses of Americans are absurd it is quite true. He disguises the bathroom as “cleaning shine”, medicine as “magical potion” and a psychiatrist as a “listener.” Cultural norms are certain behaviors that a society accepts as an entire. As it is accepted within the society it becomes a norm. There are different norms according to each culture. I found this article most interesting because Americans have many cultural beliefs…

    • 173 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The analysis of the article Body Ritual Among the Nacerima by Horace Minor uses key principles to help decipher the hidden meanings behind his work. The article is based off of Americans but written in a primitive manner to help show readers the importance of keeping an open mind. Cultural relativism is crucial when researching a new topic. This culture is different than others based on their obsession with physical appearance but it does not make them wrong. Also, the culture that practices different rituals has a different belief system. One culture may place great importance on preserving the land while…

    • 1522 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    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.…

    • 723 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    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.…

    • 633 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Body Ritual among the Nacirema” tells the story of the “unusual aspect” lifestyle and the rituals of the Americans. Miner uses a unique approach to describe not Nacirema but the Americans by using an outsider's view, a person who does not understand American's lifestyle. Nacirema is American spelled backwards Miner writes about is every household having a “shrine room” and those individuals with more power contain more than one. He remarks that the shrines rituals ‘are not with family but are private”and the box or chest which contains “magical potions”. The “shrine room” Miner describes is the bathroom and the box with magical potions is the medicine cabinet. The most important potions are described to be obtained from the medicine man who writes it down on a piece of paper in an “ancient and secret language” then is taken to the herbalist. Miner is talking about the American culture the medicine men are doctors the ancient writing are the scribbles on the prescription forms that somehow the pharmacist can understand. This helps us (Americans) realize different things about our culture and see how others view our culture.…

    • 438 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The research article about the Nacirema culture focused on a heavily religious society. In which the indualives shape their whole lives around it. Most people in the culture have at least one shrine dedicated to their physical health. It’s custom for all of the household members to pray to the shrine at least once a day. Praying is a secluded activity in the Nacirema culture and it is believed to reinforce the individual’s relationship with the divine. There is a major emphasis on the mouth and how it relates to a person’s social interaction and relationships. The mouth was so empathized that the Nacirema people visit the “Holy-mouth-man” once or twice a year, who inspects their mouths of any evil spirits using special instruments. The ancient traditions of the Nacirema culture seems to have influenced western culture.…

    • 397 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Nacirema Ritual

    • 290 Words
    • 2 Pages

    “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema” by Horace Miner discusses the ritual practice of Nacirema people, which is an ethnic group of people in America. In freshman year, I had a chance to take freshman seminar class about religion, so I know that even in one religion they have various way of ritual practice. The ritual practices are usually formed very early in the acient period of time, so most of them are unreasonable and superstitious. It is very interesting to read an article about the ritual practice of Nacirema people to understand more about a culture in the religious aspect. I was surprised to see that in every religion they usually have an image of God to worship, but Nacirema people does not. They worship to holy-mouth-man, medicine man,…

    • 290 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nacirema Culture Analysis

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages

    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…

    • 614 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays

Related Topics