African American culture and historical traditions

African-American Culture

Culture comes into existence with the development of various beliefs and values shared by people living together. Many cultures take part in shaping and molding the life practices of people and construct a framework, which serves as a guidance in many aspects. A culture is what creates an identity of people, gives them a name to be known by people and delivers the characteristics solely attributed to that specific group of people. A culture is also responsible for shaping the religious beliefs of a person. In true sense the religious practices, health practices and other relating practices combine to grow into cultures, which eventually distinguishes them from other people of unique culture (Purnell, 2009). In the book Guide to Culturally Competent Health Care written by Larry Purnell there are various cultures discussed with respect to their health behaviors and nutrition. For this research paper, African-American culture has been made the focus for discussing related questions with respect to the research paper.

The African-American culture is also called as black culture and it is an amalgamation of two types of cultures that is the Sahelean and the sub-Saharan African culture. For the African-American culture and like any culture, health care practices include the etiquettes of eating, clothing and praying. These health care practices emphasize that people should not reside in any city where there is no physician available to deal with their illness. In such cases, people are not encouraged to adopt any sort of medical treatment by their own selves. The modern diets of the African-American have changed however, certain dietary practices forbid them to eat pork or mix meat with dairy. Fried fish, macaroni, beans and greens are the common food of African-American culture. The modern practices of their health care aspect also include the treatments. These treatments should not be experimental which means any treatment cannot be conducted without the permission of an authorized person who prescribes a treatment. This also emphasizes on forbidden usage of drugs or medicines that alter the state of mind. They are forbidden to drink alcohol however, a moderate level is allowed only during special festivals or occasions. Apart from this, the health conscious African-Americans have changed their way of cooking food. They now prefer vegetable oil instead of the regular oil.

Similarly, smoking is forbidden but is not considered as the violation of the laws. High-risk behaviors practiced by the African-Americans may include the forbidden experiences of overuse of alcohol and excessive smoking. Health risky behaviors also include risky sexual behaviors in youngsters, which cause abnormal sexuality development at an early age (Nichols, 2006). According to research, the African-Americans face the most severe burden of HIV in comparison with other races.