Body Ritual among the
Nacirema
(Horace Milner, Anthropologist)
1. What are your impressions of this culture? (use adjectives to describe)
2. Highlight or underline three examples of this culture that caught your
attention.
3. Did you feel the author made value judgments or was it impartial in its
description of another culture? Highlight or underline one example to
support your answer.
4. What are some reasons why this culture may have had so many body
rituals?
5. Would you choose to live in a culture like the Nacirema? Why? Why not?
 Material
Culture
 Skyscrapers
 Computers
 Cell phones
 Cars
 TVs
 Non-material Culture
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Beliefs
Rules
Customs
Family system
Capitalist economy
 Group of people that live in a defined
territory and participate in a common
culture
 What makes up your cultural personality?
 Nature
 Genetic make-up (biology)
Nature/Biology
 Reflex
 Biologically inherited reaction to a physical
stimuli
 Pupils contract in bright light
 Drives
 Impulse to reduce discomfort
 Hungry? - you eat; Tired? - you sleep
 These do not control all human behavior
 What makes up your cultural personality?
 Nurture
 Environmental factors
 Culture
WE ARE A PRODUCT OF OUR
HEREDITY
It’s Nature AND
Nurture BABY!
AND CULTURE!!!
Knowing your culture
 The pen is mightier than…
 Better safe than…
 Don’t bite the hand that…
 No news is…
 A penny saved is a…
 Children should be seen and not…
 Better late…
Culture is learned
through…SYMBOLS
 Physical objects, sounds, smells, tastes, words
 words are a symbol for an object
 Applause
 Concert in US = positive
 Athlete in Latin America = negative
 Language frees us of time and place
 Allows future generations to access the same material
 Cultural Transmission
 Passing of culture from generation to
generation
 Symbols that guide reality
 The more important the
idea/concept/physical object the more words
we have to represent it
 US: snow = few words
Inuit (Eskimo): snow = more than twenty
 Your perception of the world differs/alters as
you learn new language
List all the words you use for “clothes”?
“food”? “car”?
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Accoutrement
Apparel
Costume
Dress
Duds
Ensemble
Frock
Garb
Garments
Gear
Hand me downs
Outfit
Rags
Regalia
Sunday Best
Threads
Wardrobe
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Bite
Chow
Cooking
Cuisine
Diet
Eats
Entrée
Fare
Feast
Fuel
Groceries
Grub
Meal
Mess
Munchies
Nourishment
Ration
Slop
Snack
Sustenance
Body language and gestures are not
always universal. Based on our
reading of “What’s A-OK in the U.S.A is
Lewd and Worthless Beyond” what
happens when the gestures we use
here in the United States don’t cross
over our borders?
Answer the following:
1. What is the gesture?
2. What does it mean here in the US?
3. What is its meaning in at least one other
country mentioned in the article?
1. Norm
A. Broad ideas about what
most people in a society
consider desirable
B. Rules defining a
specific behavior
2. Physical Object
C. Material Culture
3. Language
4. Symbol
5. Value
D. Sounds, smells, tastes,
words
E. Frees us from place
and time
Components of
 Norms
 Rules defining behavior in a specific situation
 Taught through the use of sanctions (rewards and punishments)
 Standing in line for concert tickets
 Applaud for a guest speaker
 Laws against stealing
 Unaware that we are guided by norms, until they are broken
 Cutting in line for concert tickets
 Values
 Broad ideas about what most people in a society/group consider
desirable
 Do not dictate a specific behavior
 Beliefs
 Ideas about reality
 Can be true or false
 Germans believed if they put a poster of Hitler on their walls, it would
prevent the walls from crumbling during bombing (false)
 No intelligent life exists on Mars (true – based on scientific evidence)
 Behavior is based at some level on our beliefs
 Physical objects
 Material culture
 How we relate to physical objects
Types of
 Folkways
 Mores
 Taboos
 Laws
 Norms that lack moral significance
 Not considered vital to group welfare
 Disapproval for breaking a folkway is not
costly
 Sleeping on the floor vs. in a bed
 Talking on a cell phone in the movies
 Smoking in public places (folkway turned law as
norms changed)
 Norms with GREAT moral significance
 Vital to well being of society; therefore,
conformity is a social requirement
 Cheating on a test
 Do not cry “fire” in a public place
 Pay back borrowed money
Remember…
 A folkway is more of a preference than a
requirement
 How does your family eat dinner? (At the
table, in front of the tv, together, on-yourown, eat out, daily discussion)
 What are the folkways of the cafeteria?
AND
 A more is more of a requirement than a
preference
MORE
 Most serious mores are TABOOS
 Violation demands punishment by group
 Not laws, but unacceptable
 Many relate to sexual behaviors
 Incest
 Cannibalism
 Formally defined and enforced by officials
 Consciously created and enforced
 Guided by mores – as culture changes so
do the laws (ie. smoking ban in public
places)
 Essential for society’s well being
 Running a red light
 Murder
p84 pictures, what is being
followed or broken?
p.86 silly laws chart
 Rewards/Punishments that encourage
people to follow norms
 By a certain age we conform to norms, etc.
without threat of sanctions
 Believe specific behavior is appropriate
 Avoid guilty feelings
 Fear social disapproval
 Formal
 Applied only by officials (judges, teachers)
 Reward – Congressional Medal of Honor
 Punishment – Hockey player’s loss of eligibility after hitting
another player in the face (requiring more than 20 stitches)
 Informal
 Applied by most members of a group
 Reward – thanking someone for their help
 Punishment – staring at someone for talking while
someone else is talking
Broad ideas about what most people in a
society/group consider desirable
Norms are based on them – even societies with
different norms can have similar values!
EXAMPLE:
Norms: Free Speech
Free Enterprise
Norms: Medical Care
Education
Duggar Family (US) – 19 kids and counting!
One Child Policy
(China)
Ideas about reality
Can be TRUE or FALSE
WWII Germans – Poster of Hitler on wall would
prevent it from crumbling
No intelligent life on Mars – Scientifically proven
Behavior is based at some level on beliefs
regardless of whether or not they are true!
Help us to assign cultural meaning to
physical objects (material culture)
Not defined by physical characteristics
Rather defined by our beliefs, norms, & values
-Out of service trolley: restaurant
- More “secular” instruments in church
- The CLAW
Have your group select a
physical object (material
culture) from the box. Explain
its cultural significance. Over
time, has its meaning changed?
Explain
Simply because we have
cultural guidelines…
Cultural guidelines publicly embraced by
society – “how we should behave”
High set of standards that most people aim for
Help to detect deviant behavior –
(Sanctions!)
Society’s actual behavior! – “how we
actually behave”
IDEAL vs. REAL
EXAMPLES
IDEAL CULTURE = HONESTY
REAL CULTURE = student cheat on tests,
people violate tax laws
EXTREMES like murder, rape, etc. are part
of NEITHER culture because they violate
both!
Let’s Practice…
 Cultural Components Worksheet
does change
over time
Grandparents may not have gone to college
As teenagers, your parents did not email or
text friends (communication)
Interracial dating (still not very common but
much more widely practiced)
does change over time
3 REASONS
1) Discovery – process of finding something that
already exists
EXAMPLE: Athletic ability of women – always
existed but recently acknowledged
2) Invention – creation of something new
EXAMPLE: Steam engine, cell phone, i-Pod
3) Diffusion – borrowing aspects from other cultures
EXAMPLE: Food: tacos, pizza, hamburgers
(McDonalds)
Piñatas - celebrations
 Once people learn a culture we become
strongly committed to it, can’t think
of/imagine any other way to live
 When people judge others based on our
own cultural standards =
I can’t imagine my life
without my trusty cell
phone!
However, differences do exist in society
because of various social categories
Social categories – groups that share a social
characteristic (age, gender, religion, etc.)
Subculture
- Part of a larger culture/society but differs in
an important respect
EXAMPLES: Chinatown – Chinese immigrants
pass down their native culture while also
being affected by American culture
…Youth…musicians…jocks and athletes…
 Counterculture
 A subculture that is consciously opposed to
certain central beliefs/attitudes of the larger
culture
 Motorcycle gangs, KKK, drug groups, goth,
punk
OPENING ACTIVITY
Think of an example of real and ideal
culture at Council Rock North.
Should the aspect of ideal culture be
abandoned?
Why or why not?
Across ALL cultures there exists over ____
common cultural traits –
Essential to the survival of cultures!!!
Biological needs – Because food is necessary,
cooking must be done
Physical needs – Because protection is necessary for
survival, shelter must be created
EXAMPLES: Sports, cooking, courtship, medicine,
language, music, mourning, religion, etc.
Not all cultural universals are carried out in the
same way =
Examples:
US – Typical for women to raise children
New Guinea – Men completely in charge
Can you think of Cultural Particulars for…
Cooking ? Marriage ? Sports ? Family ?
--Powerpoint made by Dave Keiper
Edited – D Wright