Nacerima Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Nacerima - Essay Example Nacirema Nacirema is a community living in North America and is known to conduct weird body rites or ceremonies. These rituals are conducted at everyday basis of their lives. Due to this habit enshrined in their customs and traditions, members of the Nacirema community are necessitated to institute a separate room in their homesteads as it will enable them to conduct their body rituals clandestinely within the comfort of their houses. Each room for conducting the rituals has a designated container that is meant for storage of magical equipments and concoctions. These are believed to be of significance for existence and well being of individuals. Available sources posit that the Nacirema possess a lot of magical equipments and concoctions that sometimes render them difficult to comprehend the aim of some of them (Minner, 2002). They are only kept for the conviction and credence that they will provide safety for the members of the family. According to Brent and Lewis (2013), â€Å"Amo ng the daily rituals is revolting, which is the practice of inserting a small bundle of hog hairs into their mouth, along with magical powders, then moving the bundle around in a series of highly formalized gestures† (60). ... It is evident that a lot of customs and traditions practiced by various communities at times emerge as uninformed, irrational, and disgusting or unpleasant to other cultures. Since time immemorial, there have been debates and discussions on the ways and manners in which groups of people should view and comprehend other people’s customs and traditions. It is important to consider the fact our fascination and interest in our customs and traditions results to us viewing it as normal. When people are too much fascinated with their customs and traditions, they view it as the true and correct manner of living that should be a force to reckon with. Nanda & Warms (2007) asserts that individual members of a certain community with distinct customs and traditions, we are prone to examine and scrutinize our customs in comparison with the traditions of other communities or societies. In doing so, individuals fall short of identifying and comprehending the importance of actions and deeds as well as constituents of other customs and traditions. Why some cultures look odd In many cases, some customs and traditions practiced by various communities may seem odd to us. For instance, some customs and traditions in Africa appear odd to Americans. This is because, being a developed nation with civilized ways of life, we forget that our ways of life are different from other nations or societies. Since America is regarded as the most powerful nation in the world, we assume that other people from other countries must emulate us. Though to some extent some of our ways of life have greatly influenced others, it is difficult for some communities to completely do away with their conventional practices. Therefore, since we are so used