Issue207【0706G－CRUSADE小组】第7次作业

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TOPIC: ISSUE207 - "Rituals and ceremonies help define a culture. Without them, societies or groups of people have a diminished sense of who they are."
WORDS: 570          TIME: 0:45:00          DATE: 2007-3-3

What is the role of rituals and ceremonies in society nowadays? The author claims that they are so helpful in defining a culture that without them societies or groups of people will have a diminished sense of who they are. I fundamentally agree with the author that Rituals and ceremonies indeed have positive impact on the definition of a culture in a religious way. However, there are still other alternatives for us to maintain our sense of belonging.

To begin with, rituals and ceremonies are an important way of defining and maintaining a culture, especially in ancient times, when technology was not so well developed. At the beginning, a nation without too much scientific knowledge might turn to rituals and ceremonies to memorize some significant events or famous persons. Then these rituals and ceremonies passed down from one generation to another, and gradually were regarded as traditions, through which to some extent a nation's culture was able to be preserved. Those rituals and ceremonies in ancient times were always inevitably of the religious meanings. But for them, culture of many nations would have been eliminated or destroyed seriously. Therefore, it is rituals and ceremonies that helped the definition of a nation's culture.

Nowadays, we are in a time when different nations mix together, which causes the mutual affect of cultures from separate nations. Rituals and ceremonies may be even more important to maintain the distinction of cultures. For example, because of the widespread 'American Dream' in the 18th and 19th centuries, migrants swarmed into the United States from all over the world, who brought in their own cultures and mixed them with others'. Now in America, most cultures have changed by the influence of others and are no longer the original ones. Considering the Chinese tradition of celebrating the Spring Festival as the start of a new year, many American born Chinese are likely to forget the Chinese Festival, let alone any ceremonies. It is a loss of culture to some extent. Therefore, a lot of old migrants miss their motherland and have a strong diminished sense of who they are. Similar cases are quite common in any mixed country, where the mutual influence of different nations changes the original cultures. Therefore, rituals and ceremonies are important to hold a culture as original as possible.

However, rituals and ceremonies are not the only helpful method of defining a culture. Since culture is a complicated system which can be defined in different angles, there are still many other alternatives helping its definition, such as words, music, architecture and customs. For example, the Chinese famous singer Song Zuying, a traditional Tu Jia Minority girl, displays the culture of Tu Jia Minority in China to all over the world with her pretty voice, by holding her concert in Washington and in Vienna. Another instance is the famous ancient town Lijiang in Yunan Province in China, where the arthitecture style is protected by the UNESCO. There is no doubt that people in the above illustrations will have a strong sense of belonging owing to the well preserved cultures. Therefore, we should not only focus on rituals and ceremonies while undermine other forms of defining a culture.  

In conclusion, rituals and ceremonies indeed help define a culture, but they are obviously not our only choice.  Moreover, we should accept that without a definition of a culture, its people are likely to suffer from a diminished sense of who they are.

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