Cultural Practices of the Nacirema

Cultural Practices of the Nacirema and Americans: Comparing and Contrasting

At first glance, it might seem that culturally-advanced and deep-thinking Americans have relatively little in common with the comparatively narcissistic, shallow, and primitive Nacirema, who carve out an existence somewhere between "the Canadian Cree, the Yaqui and Tarahumare of Mexico, and the Carab and the Awawak of the Antilles" ("Body Ritual among the Nacirema, p. 1). Who could even think to compare Americans, in our advanced state, with such a remote and isolated group? However, upon closer reflection, however, it occurred, much to the present author's surprise, that the Nacirema and Americans are in fact mirror images of one another.

First, the Nacirema have a "highly developed market economy which has evolved into a rich natural habitat" ("Body Ritual among the Nacirema, p. 1). The same might be said of Americans, where virtually everything is bought and sold. The ritual activities for the human body with which the Nacirema are obsessed could be compared to the elaborate grooming rituals of average Americans: bathing and showering, blow-drying hair, brushing and flossing teeth, applying underarm deodorants and perfumes or colognes, shaving the face (for men) and legs and underarms (for women), putting on make-up (in the past, for women only, but sometimes, now, for men, too), and cutting, trimming, bleaching, brushing, coloring, curling, or otherwise manipulating the hair. Increasingly, many Americans go so far as to but sticky, gooey little strips of some substance or other on both the top and bottom layers of their teeth and leave them there for up to half an hour each day, to make them whiter. Americans complain often of extreme tooth sensitivity due to this practice, but refuse to cease this ritual. Clearly, between grooming and attending to their advanced market economy, Americans, like the Nacirema, have little time left over for any, more idle endeavors. Also Americans, like the Nacirema, consider the human body fundamentally ugly and in need of repair. Whatever elaborate procedures, ablutions, etc., are performed upon it, there is always more to do, almost immediately.

Like the Nacirema, Americans often count their wealth by the number of shrine rooms (bathrooms) they have in their homes. Like the "box or chest which is built into the wall" ("Body Ritual among the Nacirema, p. 2) in Nacirema homes, Americans spend a great deal of time taking prescription drugs and over the counter remedies into and out of their medicine cabinets. For Americans, these medicine cabinets often have mirrors, a help in scrutinizing their ever-imperfect bodies. The faces and teeth of Americans are washed and brushed in the font (sink) below the medicine cabinet, just as the Nacirema "mingles different sorts of holy water in the font, and proceeds with a brief rite of ablution" ("Body Rituals of the Nacirema").

The "holy mouth men"("Body Rituals of the Nacirema," p. 2) are very similar, in this author's opinion, to American dentists. Just as the Nacirema believe all love, esteem, and social relationships will desert them if they do not attend carefully to various tedious and often painful mouth rituals, Americans are very similar. So horrified are Americans of their own "holy mouth men" (dentists), however, that some Americans (unlike the more fastidious Nacirema, no doubt!) actually cancel these twice-yearly necessary appointments more often than not, so as to put off this ritual tooth and gum deep-cleaning for as long as possible.