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"The magical beliefs and practices of
the Nacirema present such unusual aspects that it seems desirable to describe
them as an example of the extremes to
which human behavior can go."
In
the 3 seconds I read this very sentence every prejudice, stereotype for this
piece of writing was decided. The first time I read this short essay I had no
whatsoever clue that this essay would be devoted in criticizing the American
Society, but randomly guessed that it would describe some sadistic tribe
somewhere in Africa. Looking back I'm beginning to doubt whether the situation
would have been any better even after we were given the chance to read the
essay again and again. So mainly in this essay I would cover two factors ; my
first reaction when I realized the true meaning of "Nacirema" and how
this experience affected how I view or interact with different cultures.
I and the rest of my class was given this
essay on "Nacirema" very abruptly, without any heads up. So the
overall feeling when we started reading was a complex mixture of being
perplexed and puzzled. This feeling of perplexity got more pronounced with each
sentence we read. How it talks about a tribe called Nacirema and describing in
detail each consisting members such as "shrine box", "holy-mouth-man",
"medicine men", "listener", and "latipso" was
kind of too much to comprehend all at once. With the feeling of puzzled at its
peak I started to write down the in-class essay barely managing to read the
script in time. So the class ended like that without any further mentioning of
the topic from Mr. Menard. Then it wasn't until the next class that everyone
(well everyone except Stark) was dumbfounded after realizing the true meaning
in the script. It just all made sense "characterized by a highly developed
market economy" meaning the developed market system of USA, "shrine
box" symbolizing the medicine cabinet at the toilet, "holy-mouth-man"
the dentist, "medicine men" the pharmacist, "listener" the psychiatrist,
and "latipso" meaning the hospital. It was just amazing that someone
was able to come up with the simple but brilliant idea of relocation the alphabets
backwards. In addition to this the fact that this script was written in 1956
was just mind blowing but, the fact that this script was written considerably
long time ago also points out how long and serious this "Lookism" is
in the US society have been going on. So I was able to realize that this is a
serious problem and we better fix it before it gets out of hands.
As I mentioned previously while I was
reading this script even though the script said that Nacirema was a North
American group, I completely forgot about this and assumed that this tribe
would be one of the uncivilized tribes living in the rainforests somewhere in
South America. Like this I was able to notice myself that in my unconsciousness
I was having this stereotype that uncivilized group would be located at places
like Africa, South America while the civilized society would be located in
Europe, North America and East Asia. This realization of my own stereotype was
kind of a shock to me for I thought of myself as a person with delicate
objective perspective. Anyway this was certainly a kind of a motivation for me
and the way how I viewed other cultures have changed considerable amount since
then. I'm not saying that there aren't good or bad cultures I'm not saying that,
of course there are cultures that are morally wrong. Such as the cultures of
the Muslims that discriminates women. Which could be seen as outraging the very
core of Human Rights ; Freedom. The changes I have faced is not the matter of
right and wrong of each culture but about the fact that cultures from more developed
countries doesn't necessary mean that the culture is more developed. So I've
decided when interacting with foreigners with different cultural background I
wouldn't decipher his or her value based on the country the person is from but
measure his or her value purely on the culture itself.
To rap it up, this script about
"Nacirema" was a cultural shock to me. In both informative and
perspective way. Firstly it pointed out the serious problem of "Lookism"
happening in the US. Secondly it showed my own wrong stereotype motivating me
to look at different cultures in a completely new perspective. Furthermore
during the time while reading and analyzing this script I thought about the
effective ways of writing. In this case by relocating the alphabets backwards
and pretending to be completely different concept highly made this script
effective for this method was fresh and grasped every reader's full attention.
Overall, reading and writing this script's reflection was unique and meaningful
experience which I won't be forgetting any time soon.
I and the rest of my class was given this
essay on "Nacirema" very abruptly, without any heads up. So the
overall feeling when we started reading was a complex mixture of being
perplexed and puzzled. This feeling of perplexity got more pronounced with each
sentence we read. How it talks about a tribe called Nacirema and describing in
detail each consisting members such as "shrine box", "holy-mouth-man",
"medicine men", "listener", and "latipso" was
kind of too much to comprehend all at once. With the feeling of puzzled at its
peak I started to write down the in-class essay barely managing to read the
script in time. So the class ended like that without any further mentioning of
the topic from Mr. Menard. Then it wasn't until the next class that everyone
(well everyone except Stark) was dumbfounded after realizing the true meaning
in the script. It just all made sense "characterized by a highly developed
market economy" meaning the developed market system of USA, "shrine
box" symbolizing the medicine cabinet at the toilet, "holy-mouth-man"
the dentist, "medicine men" the pharmacist, "listener" the psychiatrist,
and "latipso" meaning the hospital. It was just amazing that someone
was able to come up with the simple but brilliant idea of relocation the alphabets
backwards. In addition to this the fact that this script was written in 1956
was just mind blowing but, the fact that this script was written considerably
long time ago also points out how long and serious this "Lookism" is
in the US society have been going on. So I was able to realize that this is a
serious problem and we better fix it before it gets out of hands.
As I mentioned previously while I was
reading this script even though the script said that Nacirema was a North
American group, I completely forgot about this and assumed that this tribe
would be one of the uncivilized tribes living in the rainforests somewhere in
South America. Like this I was able to notice myself that in my unconsciousness
I was having this stereotype that uncivilized group would be located at places
like Africa, South America while the civilized society would be located in
Europe, North America and East Asia. This realization of my own stereotype was
kind of a shock to me for I thought of myself as a person with delicate
objective perspective. Anyway this was certainly a kind of a motivation for me
and the way how I viewed other cultures have changed considerable amount since
then. I'm not saying that there aren't good or bad cultures I'm not saying that,
of course there are cultures that are morally wrong. Such as the cultures of
the Muslims that discriminates women. Which could be seen as outraging the very
core of Human Rights ; Freedom. The changes I have faced is not the matter of
right and wrong of each culture but about the fact that cultures from more developed
countries doesn't necessary mean that the culture is more developed. So I've
decided when interacting with foreigners with different cultural background I
wouldn't decipher his or her value based on the country the person is from but
measure his or her value purely on the culture itself. 
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