Sonny Not So Different At All In Nacirema, stuffing a small bundle of hog hairs into the mouth along with specific powders of magic is done to prevent from: losing teeth, any bleeding of the gums, shrinking of the jaws, losing friends and lovers. Traditions that are practiced within certain communities are everyday normal daily activities but to those outside of the community within, see them to be strange or abnormal, but in reality, they actually share a lot in common with each other. People of Kroy Wen have their own traditions and ways of life that they are accustomed to just like the people of Nacirema. Horace Miner with the influence of Professor Linton explores into the world of the very secretive Nacirema people. They are seen living in between the Canadian Cree, the Yaqui, Tarahumare of Mexico, and the Carib and Arawak of the Antilles and are believed to be originally from the East. The Nacirema people are known to possess great self-discipline and it is without a doubt that they all share the same patriotism towards their community in keeping their world private to any strangers that may come wandering around their homes. In American tradition, one would be sitting back with their mouths wide open alongside a metallic tray holding shiny sterilized instruments waiting for the dentist to fix his/her toothache. In Nacirema, the patient would instead move a bundle of hog hairs in combination with certain magical powders in their mouth in a series of highly formalized gestures, and would seek out a “holy-mouth-man” for their impressive set of augers, awls, probes, and prods. The tradition of paying for services however is both practiced in both the dentist’s and the “holy-mouth-man‘s” office. The form of payment is the only difference where the holy-mouth-man man is paid with gifts as opposed to paying the dentist with money. The one thing that is free coming from both the dentist and the holy-mouth-man is the pain. In the many homes of Americans one would probably see a huge flat screen television (sharing the alikeness of a shrine) in the center of the living room almost being idolized among the members of the house. In the homes of the Nacirema people, instead of a television they instead have an actual shrine, and depending on which category they fall under in the different social classes, they could and would have more than one shrine just like an American who goes out and buy another television after receiving their holiday bonus. Women among the Nacirema people are looked down upon if they are pregnant which is no different to some other societies. Some people celebrate pregnancies while some others get ridiculed depending on the situation and one prime example would be teenage mothers. The “listener” is another form of doctor that the Nacirema people have. The listener possesses the power to exorcise the devils that are lodged in the heads of people who have been bewitched. The listener performs his treatment by listening to the person’s troubles and fears beginning from the earliest event that could have been the start of the problems. In the American society, these “listeners” would be called psychiatrists/psychologists that do the same things as the Nacirema listeners. Traditions are something that is passed down from generation to generation, so it is without a doubt that it is going to go through changes based on the lapse of time and migration, but at the end of the day, it all derived from a sole tradition. Traditions may be different among the many various societies that exist but if looked from an open minded view, one could see that Nacirema spells American backwards; we are not so different at all.