Terrorism is the use of terror in a form of violence or threats that is meant to coerce individuals, groups or entity acting in a manner in which a person or group couldn’t otherwise force them to act lawfully. Acts of terrorism appears to be or intended to intimidate civilians collectively or to intimidate changes in government policy or government conduct through the use of serious destruction, assassination or kidnapping. Terrorism has affected the United States in the last decade. The root of terrorism is hatred and there’s nothing more dangerous than knowing that terrorist believe that they have nothing to lose.…
Barbara Myeroff, of Peyote Hunt, The Sacred Journey of the Huichol Indians, writes of the rituals within the Huichol religion and generalizes, “Rituals occur, significantly, in dangerous situations” (239). These dangerous situations often occur as a result of a time of change and the dangers may either be a literal physical risk to well-being or it can be a perceived fear. It is interpreted that ritual can be utilized to stabilize a variety of dangerous changing environments to meet societal norms, so that the danger may be controlled.…
Larry Agenbroad, a paleontologist from Northern Arizona University, went under the presumption that maybe the ancient Plains Indians did as the modern Plains Indians have been known to do. This was to often break open the crania of the bison to remove the brains and use them in their process of tanning hides.…
Good evidence of this is when Cabeza in Document C described how he did the operation on the Native American because he had to remove the point of the arrow that was resting over his heart. He then ended by saying “ I removed the two stitches from the Indian and he was healed and this cure gave us a great reputation among them throughout the whole land”. This evidence also explains how Cabeza stayed alive because by him saving one of their own, it gave him and his fellow castaways a better chance at staying alive by the great reputation that was stimulated among doing this procedure.…
“I've took cocaine, I've smoked marijuana, drunk whiskey, and been high on all that, but this high you get on Jesus, it's nothin', nothin' compared to that...”…
When one looks back to English history, the removal of various body parts from criminals of all sorts is quite common as a punishment. A beheading, however, was generally reserved for usurpers of power or those who had committed the act of treason against their ruler. The reasoning behind this unique punishment was the common association of one’s head with the ruling power of the king, and if one threw off their king, the head must follow as well. However, beheadings were not only limited to fellow Englishmen, but could be also used on those who were considered to be savages. Algonquians, a group of Native Americans that had a great presence in the area of the thirteen British colonies, also placed great importance on dismemberment. Traditionally, warriors that were captured during battle by opposing sides were ritually dismembered, which gave the dying warrior a chance to reclaim his honor by accepting the pain stoically and the triumphant tribe in turn gained the spiritual strength of the opposing warrior. Once in possession of severed heads, scalps, hands, and feet, the Algonquians tended to use them as a way of creating alliances and solidifying bonds between each other.…
The Chinese believed in the rebirth of their world and in reincarnation. They fought with goodness and evil, demons and gods. The Sumerians believed and trusted in their gods and wanted to stay in their good graces. "All gods needed to be fed and had to receive their portions of food and meals or they were fed metaphorically by the devotion, obedience and self- sacrifice of their adherents." (Lewis) These cultures fed their gods, spirits and ancestors with offerings Sacrifice as a theme has universal similarities from human, animal and material offerings.…
Anthropologist Peter A. Metcalf observed the practices of the Berawan tribe, found along Borneo’s north-central waterways, including the tribe’s four-stage funeral rites (Metcalf 1993, p. 325). The first stage lasts two to ten days and includes ‘rites performed immediately after death’ (Metcalf 1993, p. 325). The second stage, eight months to several years in duration (Metcalf 1993, p. 325), sees the corpse stored on a platform or in the communal residence with the remains contained in a coffin, earthenware jar or similar vessel (Metcalf 1993, p. 325). During this period the corpse decomposes, allowing the soul’s transformation to ‘perfect spirit’ (Metcalf 1993, p. 326). However during this period the soul lurks close by, restless and uneasy, spreading the risk of illness to the living and the possibility of corpse reanimation by an evil spirit (Metcalf 1993, p. 326). During the third stage, which Hertz referred to as ‘the great feast’ (Metcalf 1993, p.326), the remains are brought into the residence and guests celebrate the deceased for six to ten days (Metcalf 1993, p. 325). The bones may be removed and cleaned in preparation for the fourth stage - the deceased’s final burial wherein the physical remains are housed in a receptacle of value, such as a glazed jar or wooden coffin, with that receptacle accommodated in a large mausoleum; safe in the knowledge the soul had transcended (Metcalf 1993, p. 325).…
Begley, S. (19 March, 2007). Beyond Stones & Bones. Newsweek. Retrieved March 24, 2008, from http://www.sks.sirs.com…
the concept of human sacrifice is fundamentally repugnant. It may be this, more than any other factor, that accounts for the limited number of anthropological studies of the incidence of human sacrifice in the history of human religious practices. However, violence to the human body has historically been an integral part of religious practices, whether it be mass suicides, as in India; prolonged torture, as in Oceania, North America and Europe; ritualized cannibalism, as in Fiji; people being buried alive, as in ancient Ur and South America; or the dead being exhumed and…
Horace Miner expresses both irony and ridicule towards the American culture in his article “Body Ritual among the Nacirema”. He uses a sociological approach that is rather witty, using a fictitious North American group called the “Nacirema”. The views of this culture are much like our own, depicting the importance of societal status, wealth, health and appearance.…
Santillanes, Gary. “Releasing the Spirit: A Lesson in Native American Funeral Rituals.” October, 1997. The University of Minnesota. December 14, 1998. http://www.umn.edu…
Horace Miner writes about the Nacirema, a culture steeped in magic and superstition. Their ways of life are portrayed as uncivilized and barbaric. The Nacirema perform rituals and rites that are strange to us here in the civilized world. The description and portrayal of this tribe make it very hard for the reader to connect or even begin to understand such a strange people. Miner starts of the article creating an atmosphere of wonderment; “if all of the logically possible combinations of behavior have not been found somewhere in the world, he(anthropologist) is apt to suspect that they must be present in some yet undescribed tribe”(Miner:1956:503). And that tribe is the Nacirema, a foreign and strange people to whom we in the western world could never relate. However, if ones look closely at the text and the hints provided, it is clear that Horace Miner has tricked us into ethnocentrism, all the while describing to us the American culture. In fact the word Nacirema is American spelled backward. The Body Rituals of the Nacirema is in fact a satire on the American culture of the 1950’s.…
Morality in religion is based on feelings of action, consequences of existing supernatural “Gods”, and intuition of religious concepts. Morality help makes religion comprehendible and interpreted in social terms. Misfortune is a byproduct exposing important occurrences in terms of social interaction. For example, “Gods” and other natural beings having the power to perform good or bad tasks against people and places. Another example may be the misperception of witchcraft worldwide. Social interaction must represent people’s beliefs and intentions on a trust worthy level and so on and so forth. In his fourth subtitle, “Precaution, Ritual, and Obsession”, Boyer talks about anthropologist studies showing themes of magical and ritual thinking to be dangerous. These dangers can be physical contact, invisible substances and the amount. They somewhat cherish cleanliness, like it is purity to them. Their fear related themes relate to OCD. These factors may be of a neural…
some look upon it as shameful and wrong that it is of some good cause. If only…