Life Among The Nacirema

8 Pages 2054 Words

e their role and is very seldom excepted back into the standard group. He is degraded into a lower class. He may pay occasional visits to higher group members but is no longer a true member in himself.

One ritual way to alter the appearance of the body is to lightly burn the skins surface. This is torturous and hours are spent under a fiery blaze. Another custom frequently practiced is to rub liquids in the form of oils, lotions, or sprays into the skin in order to add color and smell.

In order to enforce the social norms the Nacirema leaders use high-pressure harsh persuasion methods similar to those used in brainwashing. For instance young children often refuse to partake in rituals and must be physically forced by the adults to perform them daily. By the time they are adults every part of the ritual is memorized and they perform them without thinking.

One example of these rituals is the ceremonies of the shrine room. Each day every member of the family, one after another, enters the shrine room, bows his head, and mixes different sorts of holy water in a basin. He or she then conducts a brief ceremony of ritual cleansing. The holy waters come from the Water Temple of the community, where the priests conduct elaborate ceremonies to make the liquid ritually pure.

Another of the customs of the Nacirema includes trips to the Great Temple or latipsoh, which is run by the Medicine Man. When people become sick they are sent there to have evil sprits ritually caste out with latipsoh ceremonies. Many people who go to the latipsoh to be healed actually die during the curing ceremonies. Children plead not to be taken to the latipsoh before their indoctrination is complete. One Naci...