What is Culture? Before reading Chapter 3 of text and the article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema” my understanding of culture was plainly the way we, humans, live based on the environment we grow up in. Macionis defines culture as “the ways of thinking, they ways of acting, and the material objects that together form a people’s way of life”. In the text, the Author discusses the different ways people think, act and value around the world. The way people act in other regions of the world in contrast to us, Americans, and the importance of objects in different cultures.
Macionis talks about people in the Brazilian rain forest, the Yanomamo. The Yanomamos think that aggression is normal, chiefly due to their need to survive and protect themselves, in the environment they live in. In some areas of the United States, aggression is also a common way of life due to their milieu. I once visited a friend in a small neighborhood in Oakland. This low income, and high in crime neighborhood, was filled with people who appeared to walk the streets with a sense of paranoia. Driving to my friend’s apartment, I got lost, so I decided to pull over to ask for directions. I spotted a young lady, who appeared to be waiting for someone to arrive, and I asked her for directions. The girl's …show more content…
Nacirema is American spelled backwards. Miner describes the importance of the body to the average American. Horace calls the bathroom the “shrine room”, where most Americans take care of the bodies, and speaks about it as one of the most important places in one’s home. Horace points out different examples of what Americans feel as “necessities” to upkeep our bodies and our appearances, so that our own culture will accept us. Going to the gym on a regular basis is important to us, yet to people in poor countries such activity may not even be thought
Macionis talks about people in the Brazilian rain forest, the Yanomamo. The Yanomamos think that aggression is normal, chiefly due to their need to survive and protect themselves, in the environment they live in. In some areas of the United States, aggression is also a common way of life due to their milieu. I once visited a friend in a small neighborhood in Oakland. This low income, and high in crime neighborhood, was filled with people who appeared to walk the streets with a sense of paranoia. Driving to my friend’s apartment, I got lost, so I decided to pull over to ask for directions. I spotted a young lady, who appeared to be waiting for someone to arrive, and I asked her for directions. The girl's …show more content…
Nacirema is American spelled backwards. Miner describes the importance of the body to the average American. Horace calls the bathroom the “shrine room”, where most Americans take care of the bodies, and speaks about it as one of the most important places in one’s home. Horace points out different examples of what Americans feel as “necessities” to upkeep our bodies and our appearances, so that our own culture will accept us. Going to the gym on a regular basis is important to us, yet to people in poor countries such activity may not even be thought