IHSS Blog 2019-2020

  Leon Hoang Mr. Roddy IHSS 26 August, 2020 IHSS: Anthropology Reading - The Nacirema “The fundamental belief underlying the whole system appears to be that the human body is ugly and that its natural tendency is to debility and disease” (Miner). This sets up a cause and effect scenario in which if man practices ritual and ceremony, disease will not occur. For this very reason, families have one or more shrines dedicated to rituals in every home. It seems that religion is more important to them than anything else in life. Another fascinating thing was the obsession with mouths that the Nacirema have. They believe that the mouth could be the cause of most illnesses and go to the supposed "holy-mouth-men" for a cure. Despite the ghastly techniques that the holy mouth men use, such as inserting hog hairs and using crude tools to fill holes in with a “magical material”,  in the eyes of the subject this is simply required in order to stop decay. The thing that is interesting, is t

  Miriam Isabelle P. Saxon  Mr. Roddy IHSS 8/26/20 The  “Nacirema” (Disclaimer I was planning to write this as I read the material, but I quickly had a revelation about it and changed how I was originally planning to write it. I left in my original begging because I thought you might find it interesting.) Anthropology is a field in which diversity is very common in their work, but the way in which the Nacirema act is so extreme that it is surprising even to someone who works is so heavily steeped in abnormality. The Nacirema are still surrounded in mystery as little is known about their origin other than their vague comments about coming from the east. They are located in North American between Canada and Mexico...that's where America is. Wait, Nacirema is American spelled backwards...is this a joke?  (I was originally planning on writing this as I read the article but after my earlier revelation I read the article then came back and wrote the rest of my response.) Even though

Ariela Kluk Mr. Roddy IHSS 8/24/20 I found the Nacirema tribe’s exotic customs very unique and some of their traditions which I have never heard before very strange. One thing I found strange was their obsession with mouths and how there rituals and treatments destroyed them and caused tooth decay instead of healing them. I do not understand why the people would pay to go to the temple where intense rituals take place when the rituals can cause them to die. Although I was fascinated by how strongly the tribes believed in the rituals and how if they did not practice the rituals they thought their teeth would fall out, their lovers would disappear and a variation of other horrible things would happen to them. I respect how they follow there believes very well and how their traditions were the center of their lives. I was weirded out learning about how They put themselves through pain during these rituals so that these horrible things won’t happen to them causing them to be masochistic an