To help you become more aware of how strange your own culture might seem to an outsider.
Re-read the Body Ritual Among the Nacirema(I will up it) and take a look at the movie about Africans making a documentary about European culture: Darkest Austria.mp4(https://archive.org/details/KayongaKagameShowsUsTheWorld.EpisodeDarkestAustria) Write about a particular set of rituals practiced in the culture in which you grew up. Focus on one set of ritualsg. eating, marriage rituals, dating rituals, childbirth rituals, death, a particular set or rituals at work, when traveling, in leisure activities (I encourage you to choose your own) in a similar style to the Body Ritual article or the African documentary.
1. What is the main belief that underlies the rituals that you are describing? (e.g. that the body is ugly (in the case of the Nacirema))
2. Why might outsiders to your culture think that these rituals and beliefs are strange/exotic? ie put yourself in the position of the outsider.
3. How would you help an outsider understand the rituals in a less ethnocentric way? (ie maybe you can find some way to make it seem less strange, as I did when explaining the similarities between the Nacirema with American/Western culture).
