Free Essay On Anthropology

Journalists, government policy makers, social scientists and individual groups in various societies in the world today use terminologies such as uncivilized, traditional, undeveloped, primitive and pre-modern when referring to certain non-Western peoples and cultures. The use of these words communicates a given degree of ethnocentrism. Ethnocentrism takes place in certain groups of circles where a given circle or group of individuals live together and have beliefs that such a group is everything or superior to all other existent groups. In this context, some of the Americans and others have attitudes towards other cultures that demean these cultures. These attitudes are often ethnocentric and are often driven by the superiority complex that defines most of these individuals.
Ethnocentrism is one of the key reasons for the existence of divisions among members of different ethnicities, races, and religious groups. The groups of members of a given ethnocentric group such as the Americans and others have the belief that their group is superior to others around it such as the Africans and the Ndembu. Although there are many people who cannot identify practices of ethnocentrism or the ethnocentric groups in the world today, such groups exist both at the social and political levels. Members of a given ethnocentric group such as the Americans and others believe that they are particular and superior culturally and those cultures or groups of cultures outside their group may lack the capacity to understand their way of life.
In the contemporary world, the issues and instances of ethnocentrism and the existence of ethnocentric groups or cultures have reduced greatly. Nevertheless, these groups develop attitudes towards other groups around them that portray the ethnocentric practices and beliefs, which are still existent, but to a reduced degree. As such, the remaining ones practices or hold aspects such as stereotyping against certain groups. The development of these attitudes by the Americans and other groups towards the culture and way of life of other groups such as the Africans and the Ndembu is based on the belief that these groups are lesser, primitive, uncivilized, undeveloped, traditional and pre-modern. The Americans and other cultures or groups of individuals perceive themselves to be progressive when compared to others.

Indifference

The Americans, as well as other groups of people with ethnocentric characteristics, are indifferent towards other cultures such as the Ndembu and the Africans among others. They portray a lack of interest and often show instances of unimportance towards the cultures and way of life of these other cultures. As such, they place themselves in these cultures and perceive them as uncivilized compared to them. This aspect of comparison shows the levels of inconsequentiality by these groups of people considering themselves as superior towards the other groups. The indifferent attitudes developed by the other groups of people and the Americans among others often leads to the development of rifts among these people.
When they consider the Ndembu or Ju/Wasi as uncivilized, it shows the level of insignificance that they have towards them. Such attitudes can often create a rift between the involved cultures. Whereas they consider some of the cultural activities of these people as uncivilized, just because it is very different from theirs, it is still their way of life and they have to show appreciation in lieu of indifference towards that particular way of life. For this reason, despite some of the appraisals being correct, the extent to which the groups that consider them accurate tends to be biased; hence, makes them ethnocentric.

Contemptuous

They also develop contemptuous attitudes towards the cultures and beliefs of others such as the Ndembu. Most of these groups of people that the Americans and other groups are ethnocentric towards have a rich diversity in their culture. That is; most of them have many tribes. For this reasons, each of the tribes has its way of life, which has been passed on from generation to generation. However, these groups of individuals considering themselves as superior view these other people as primitive. Because some of the Americans and other groups view the Wasi or Africans as primitive, the truth is that most of these groups of people uphold their cultural activities. As such, the cultural views and practices in these cultures that were existent at the beginning of time are still in place because they are passed from one generation to the next.
For this reason, it is scoffing when such individuals clouded by superiority complex refer the others as primitive basing on the age of the cultural practices of these groups of people. In addition, these most of the ethnocentric groups of people have only one tribe; hence, there is no diversity in the culture. As such, when they experience these other cultural aspects, they develop tendencies of believing that they are primitive. For this reason, while, on the contrary, the appraisals may be accurate according to these groups of people considering themselves as superior, the lesser cultures believe that is biased on their part.

Skeptical

Some of the Americans and other groups of people are skeptical towards other groups that they consider inferior to them such as the Africans, the Ndembu, and the Wasi or Ju. They are skeptical because they do not understand the ways of life of these people. It is not wrong that they have such attitudes because they have doubts and reservations concerning these other ways of life. For instance, when they compare themselves with the levels of modernization and development of these other cultures, they doubtful and wonder what the cause of the huge difference might be. As such, they believe that these other groups of people are undeveloped and pre-modern.
They compare the levels of modernization in terms of the education systems and the levels of infrastructure and realize the existence of a huge gap between the two cultures. For this reason, they become skeptical and sometimes even cynical when they become concerned with their interests and disregard typically the appropriate and accepted standards and ways of living of these other groups of people in the society. Whereas it might be a fact that the appraisals and attitudes of some of these Americans well as other groups considering themselves as superior are appropriate in their own eyes, the other groups of cultures such as the Ndembu and Wasi think that they are stereotyped or biased and sometimes feel that these superior groups develop prejudice against them.
In summary, the attitudes developed by these ethnocentric groups of people are often not favorable towards the other cultures. In addition, these ethnocentric groups might view their attitudes and appraisals as appropriate when in reality the extent to which they uphold these attitudes portrays their biases towards the other groups and cultures that they consider inferior.