The focal point of the shrine is a box or chest which is built into the wall. Many charms and magical potions without which no native believes he could live. These preparations are secured from a variety of specialized practitioners. The most powerful of these are the medicine men, whose assistance must be rewarded with substantial gifts.
Who are the Nacirema’s holy-mouth-men?
In the hierarchy of magical practitioners, and below the medicine men in prestige, are specialists whose designation is best translated “holy-mouth-men.” The Nacirema have an almost pathological horror and fascination with the mouth, the condition of which is believed to have a supernatural influence on all social relationships. The Nacirema believe if they did not perform such rituals their teeth would fall out, their gums bleed, their jaws shrink, their friends desert them, and their lovers reject them. The Nacirema seek out a holy-mouth-man once or twice a year. The holy-mouth-man opens the client’s mouth and, using a variety of augers, awls, probes, and prods, enlarges any holes which decay may have created in the teeth. Magical materials are put into these holes. The extremely sacred and traditional character of the rite is evident in the fact that the natives return to the holy-mouth-men year after year, despite the fact that their teeth continue to decay.
What is the latipso used by Nacireman medicine men?
The medicine men have an imposing temple, or latipso, in every community of any size. The latipso ceremonies are so harsh that it is phenomenal that a fair proportion of the really sick natives who enter the temple ever recover. Sick adults are not only willing but eager to undergo the protracted ritual purification, if they can afford to do so. The daily ceremonies, like the rites of the holy-mouth-men, involve discomfort and torture. With ritual precision, the vestals awaken their miserable charges each dawn and roll them about on their beds of pain while performing ablutions, in the formal movements of which the maidens are highly trained. At other times they insert magic wands in the supplicant’s mouth or force him to eat substances which are supposed to be healing. The fact that these temple ceremonies may not cure, and may even kill the neophyte, in no way decreases the people’s faith in the medicine men.
Who is the witch-doctor “listener” who is able to cure bewitched people?
Their remains on other kind of practitioner, known as a “listener.” This witch-doctor has the power to exorcise the devils that lodge in the heads of people who have been bewitched. The Nacirema believe that parents bewitch their own children. The counter-magic of the witch-doctor is unusual in its lack of ritual. The patient simply tells the “listener” all his troubles and fears, beginning with the earliest difficulties he can remember.
Is Miner’s interpretation of Nacirema body rituals ethnocentric? Why or why not?
In my opinion I feel that Horace Miner is being ethnocentric. I believe that he is judging the Nacirema’s beliefs and rituals. Most of us see what we do as a culture as being normal. So for other cultures, they all believe in what they are taught. The Nacirema’s body rituals may seem very sadistic but that is what they believe.