Rituals of the Nacerima
The types of practices of the Nacerima are definitely different to what we experience but I found this article was very eye opening and made me want to find out more about their lifestyle.
The five words I'd describe the population discussed by Miner would be: faithful, omniscient, mysterious, shamanistic, and hierarchical.
Faithful: One thing I definitely picked up from the reading is that these people are entirely faithful or devoted to the practices of their kind and don't seem to have any negative reaction to certain rituals. I may not know all the details or know what truly goes on in the minds of the Nacerima, but from what I read it was almost as if they breathe a sigh of relief when they partake in rituals. They'd sacrifice their own comfort for the sake of being "cured" like having holes drilled into their teeth. We can see the extent of their faith when mentioned that kids don't want to go to the temple because that's where people die but all the elderly and sick take it as a blessing to be able to go even if death is probable.
Omniscient: When I say I mean omniscient I mean it in the sense that these people, especially the higher ranked ones, know of everything that goes on in their population. They know what magical rituals are needed for certain areas of life and what prescriptions/herbs are needed. I don't mean this in the sense that know/predict what is coming but in the sense that they just "all-knowing" in their culture.
Mysterious: When I was reading this article I had a feeling that even within their community their practices and knowledge is arcane. The "common people" know the general gist of why they do the rituals they do but for some reason I feel like the medicine men, magical practitioners, and holy-mouth-men are mysterious and don't appreciate their ways being shared which is why only a selected few are chosen.
Shamanistic: I can tell that their culture has to do with or is similar to shaman rituals. The practitioners do these things for the sake of exorcising evil or have the ability to cure others through magical practices and we see this in their "mouth-rite" where this was established because there are "evils of the mouth." We're also not told about the specifics of the latipso ceremonies aside that it's pretty close to "torture" but I can assume that the medicine men conduct "spells" and other shamanistic techniques to offer a cure.
Hierarchical: This community works under an established hierarchy which tells us a lot about how the population functions and how they go on about in their daily lives. At the top of the hierarchy pyramid, we have the magical practitioners the medicine men/herbalists, then everyone else. There is also a hierarchy amongst the common people and that was decided on how rich they are in shrines. The wealthy have more shrines in their homes and are built with better material.
PART B:
No.1 When it came to the descriptive words that involved how the community works as a whole then I can say they were somewhat accurate. Obviously us Americans don't "believe" in shamans and I definitely wouldn't call American culture mysterious because I we are REALLY loud. I mean loud in many ways but I mainly mean that we don't mind flaunting what we have. This leads me to the word "omniscient" because even though I am an American, I hate how our culture involves us "always knowing" and being "right."
No.2
After rereading my word choices and the explanation provided I'd say I didn't exhibit ethnocentrism. I really tried putting all biases of what was "right and wrong" away and wanted to view this article with an anthropologists point of view. I stated what I said because I was given new information and took it as that without judging anything (at least I hope not). Who knows, maybe ethnocentrism is just something that has been engraved so deeply within us that I am unable to see if I put any bias on any of my words. In that case, I would love for anyone to call me out and explain why.
No.3
I don't know if the word "shamanistic" is biased because this is a term usually used for people who live a completely different lifestyle with different beliefs than Americans so I'm still debating if this word is ethnocentric on my part. In our modern metropolis, it's not common to come across Shamans so I wouldn't know of another word to replace this one, if it does show any signs of bias.
No.4
I personally find beauty in every culture and know that they have their customs that date thousands of years so I don't see the point of judging even if it's something my own culture taught me is "wrong." It's because of this that it's important to describe another culture as free as possible because if we put our own biases and use external factors like tone of voice and facial features, we'll give off the wrong idea and make that culture look bad to others. I would definitely love to talk to cultural anthropologists and hear what their first thoughts are when interacting with a different culture for the first time. I say this because we can all say that we go into learning about cultures free from biases but I feel like no matter what, there will always be that initial thought of, "oh, this is different." I don't know if this is problematic of me to think but I'd also like to ruminate over this question more and question the footing of cultural anthropology as a whole. This field of study asks why cultures do the things they do but maybe that may be a bit ethnocentric of us. It's almost like saying, because you are doing something different, I'd like to study why it's different, and that sounds a bit like we started this field of study by being intrigued but also silently judging them from our own experiences.
Part A Review:
ReplyDeleteI am only scoring this part of the assignment for completion. I will post another comment on Friday after you submit Part B with feedback.
Five descriptive words recorded. (20/20)
Part B Review:
ReplyDeleteSo for your first section, remember what Minor is actually describing... he is describing aspects of our health care practices, both personal health care at home, dental care and hospital care. So while I can see how some of your words might *generally* describe aspects of American culture, does it *accurately describe our medical practices? Is it shamanistic? Do we go to the dentist because of faith or because we need to get our teeth fixed? And while I get your point on "mysterious", could that be because Minor was intentionally making the process mysterious and unknowable? Remember that you chose these words based upon MInor's intentionally biased and rather judgmental article about the "Nacerima". If your choice is based upon biased information, should we be surprised that our descriptions are also biased?
"maybe ethnocentrism is just something that has been engraved so deeply within us that I am unable to see if I put any bias on any of my words."
Good observation. But recognize that bias will result in an inaccurate description of a practice (and the bias can be negative OR positive). So again the question is whether your words *accurately* describe the practices Minor is discussing? Do they accurately describe how/why we brush our teeth? Why we go to the dentist? And why we go to the hospital and what we experience there? Step back and take a second look at your word choice from that perspective. If they aren't accurate, there is bias present.
For your third section, is it accurate to describe our healthcare practices as being "faithful"? Is medical/dental practices based upon faith or science? Do doctors and dentists really know all (omniscient) or do they just sometimes act that way (and how Minor describes them).
This sentence caught my eye in your last paragraph:
"This field of study asks why cultures do the things they do but maybe that may be a bit ethnocentric of us. "
Why is it ethnocentric to ask why? It is ethnocentric to judge a culture for being different. It is NOT ethnocentric for recognizing that all cultures do thing differently and for trying to understand why cultures practices behaviors as they do. Trying to understand is not biased. Refusing to understand IS biased.
Anthropologists are human, and so bias is going to be nearly impossible to completely avoid, but being aware of your own bias is a good step toward avoiding it. I would argue that there is no way we could avoid the dangers of bias (racism, bigotry, misogyny, xenophobia) without being willing to try to actually understand the culture of others than our own. Ignorance is never the solution.
Hey Jacqueline,
ReplyDeleteI find the words you chose to be pretty articulate of the behaviors of the "Nacerima" you wanted to highlight. I also appreciate your mention of unknown ethnocentrism in the second prompt. A word might seem neutral to us as our culture and society view it as so, but this same perspective could be considered positive or negative to the culture which we are trying to understand.
Hi Jacqueline, I really like your post, but there was one thing I disagreed with. I don't necessarily believe that it is ethnocentricity of us when analyzing and studying a culture if we are just trying to understand them, not judge or categorize them. We study different cultures to get a better understanding of their characters and what they seem to hold dear to their hearts, not to belittle them.
ReplyDelete