Reflection on my in-class response to Body Ritual Among the Nacirema by Horace Miner.

The appearance of Nacirema that I assume

 The first impression when I got the paper about Nacirema was embarrassing. This is because Mr. Menard gives a surprise present, surprising essay day. Then, when I read it, I become more nervous because the sentence structure and lexicons in the writing were so hard that I couldn't understand them easily. For example, the difficult expressions like 'incarcerated' or 'thaumaturge' kept me from understanding the writing.

Anyway, because Mr. Menard made us write an essay about it and I thought it was important for my score, I tried my best to understand it. Then, I wrote an essay about it with incomplete understanding. I thought Nacirema's ritual activity was very cruel and barbaric. Unbelievable ritual torture such as baking women's heads in small ovens seems like the scene in 'Saw.' I assumed someone who suppose cultural relativism would claim that we should respect their cultures because each culture is different but not wrong. I thought this opinion has a problem. I thought even though we should respect variety of cultures, the cultures should follow universal natural rights of man. I had tried to write about it in the essay, but failed because of lack of time.

Then, two days after surprising essay day, I had Mr. Menard's class again. In the class, I realized the trick of the writing. 

Nacirema was a backword of American. The description of Nacirema's ritual activity is actually a description of American's routine. Making holes in tooth is a treating a cavity and baking women's head in a small oven is getting a perm. It was really fun but a little bit shocking. I was deceived by the difficult lexicon, sentence structure and the authority of the professor in the writing.

Other than difficult sentences and vocabularies, there are some elements which make me be deceived by the writing. First, The writing describes the writing Nacirema like describing the nature of animals or plants. In the writing, the observer observed Nacirema with the thought that they are different and far away from us. Therefore, I feel their culture is absolutely unrelated to us. It makes me unrealize the truth of Nacirema. Also, the writing style which seems objective and realistic causes me to be deceived. We can find it in the society . When we learn about other cultures, we don't feel that culture and usually just learn by the book. Therefore, we feel we observe other cultures and it interrupts real understanding of the culture.

Furthermore, it was written in 1950's. It is far away from the present so readers can feel sense of difference. Therefore, it makes Nacirema's story plausible because it was past. If it were written in 2000's and Nacirema were still alive, it would be more unbelievable.

In addition to the clever tricks in the writing, I can't deny that my previous thought and education affect my thought in my first essay. I thought Nacirema is barbaric and cruel. I accepted the fake observation about Nacirema in the writing. I think I thought like that because I have read the observation of cultures which is based on the thought of the main current cultures. It means I ha accepted the observation which the observer interpret with the standard of the main current culture. This observation can lead misunderstanding of the culture. For example, to exaggerate, future's people could interpret silicone in present woman's breast as a symbol of deep piety. It sounds absurd and other tribes in Africa also can think that our interpretation is absurd.

After I had read and thought about Nacirema, there were a lot of change in my idea of other cultures and other things. First of all, I started to try to assess other cultures with consideration 'who am I.' To be more detailed, 'who am I in the various society.' Because I had been born in the society, my sense of value and morality are fit for the society's value. Therefore, when I see other cultures, my decision is affected by the society's value. Actually, each society pursues different values and anyone doesn't know which is better or right. So, I decided to not to assess other cultures recklessly without consideration of variety of cultures.

However, although I consider them carefully, still there is a possibility that people from other cultures don't care about us. Therefore, I thought I should consider how people form different cultures think about me. My culture is unfamiliar culture to them. They would try to understand us with their own culture and it also can lead misunderstanding. Therefore, we should consider it when we interact with people from other countries and have different cultures.

In conclusion, Nacirema is very meaningful stuff for me. It teaches me that I should study harder to prevent being deceived by difficult words. Also, my idea and attitude to different cultures changed to positive ways. I become more careful to them and it will lead positive communication between . So, Nacirema was so meaningful.