In the article written by Horace Miner, he describes the inner workings of body rituals among the Nacerima. To a person not belonging to this culture, their rituals may appear to be extreme and grotesque. One might wonder why someone would even feel the need to go through such rituals. The Nacerima has a very interesting view when it comes to people's mouths. The Nacirema have an almost pathological horror of and fascination with the mouth, the condition of which is believed to have a supernatural influence on all social relationships"(2). To someone belonging to another culture, this is something that would be very strange. Here, people don't really put emphasis on mouths. Mouths are not seen as things that can ruin a person's life. Many find mouths powerful because they give us the power to speak. Something as simple as this difference may cast negative views towards this group of people. Because it is different, it becomes weird and strange, something others do not wish to take part of.
The Nacerimas also have different views when it comes to the human body. In their culture, A few women afflicted with almost inhuman hyper-mammary development are so idolized that they make a handsome living by simply going from village to village and permitting the natives to stare at them for a fee" (4). This idolizing of the human can be seen as demeaning to the woman involved. But in their culture, they are seen as powerful and are idolized. They are perfection personified. This showing of one's body may be seen by others as wrong, when it is simply the right thing to do in their culture. This too can cause negative views of the women and people of this culture. Not understanding the importance of a ritual to a culture can once again cause confusion and judgement, ultimately leading to harsh feelings towards a group.
In the case of Australia, laws were in place that caused turmoil and grief for those of the Aborigines. Children were taken from their families and their culture was degraded and looked down upon. Australia's parliament finally took a stand and made a public apology and declaring that their past treatment towards Aborigines will be righted. This apology shows that Australia is finally taking responsibilities for their actions and realizing the pain and torture that has been inflicted upon these people just because they were seen as different. This also shows that through educating and understanding the differences between cultures, peace may eventually occur. This is a huge step for a country to responsibility for their actions and realize that what they were doing was wrong. Australia's apology should help other countries and groups of people to take a stand and change the way certain cultures are treated.
Cultural identity is something that everyone has. We all have culture. No culture is more important than another.
You brought up a couple of great points that I just skimmed over while exploring these readings. The women “afflicted” with extraordinary mammary development were known to go village to village to get paid to be stared at. Don’t we do the same thing in our culture? Think about Playboy and Hustler magazines and strip clubs. These are women with amazing bodies (usually!) that get paid to be looked at. And what about restaurants like Hooter’s? The waitresses wear short shorts and small, tight, low-cut tee’s and probably make as much or more in tips than many of us do working at a desk for a week. I think this gives them quite a bit of power! I agree that it puts women in a negative light and although it doesn’t necessarily make it morally right it is certainly a prevalent theme in our culture.
ReplyDeleteAustralia’s apology to the Aborigine people has been a long time coming. Their treatment of this group isn’t so different than the American’s treatment of Native American Indians. We took land, lives, and separated families because we saw them as different when we were actually the ones who infringed on their land and lifestyle. But, because we viewed ourselves as a civilized people and didn’t understand their practices, it was better to dismantle their culture than to try to understand it.