6TH GRADE LIFE-CHANGER by Gab

6TH GRADE LIFE-CHANGER by Gab - August 2013 Scholarship Essay

When I was in sixth grade, my teacher taught our class a very important lesson. She described a foreign culture with many rituals (such as face painting, elaborate hair sculptures, constant daily travel, and body adornments). Many of these acts sounded very strange to a sixth grader. Many believed it was an indigenous tribe from Africa we had seen on National Geographic. To my surprise, the culture my teacher was describing was our own (putting on makeup, doing your hair, going to and from work, getting dressed, etc). How could such seemingly unrelated rituals actually be the same? This was my first lecture in understanding the flaws of cultural ethnocentrism. This homily has stuck with me since sixth grade and taught me how to analyze my perceptions more carefully and thoughtfully. It is a constant reminder on how to vastly interpret not just the world and other cultures, but everything around you and in your daily life. Everything is given a label, a connotation, a meaning, etc., but everything has manifold. Absorbing this is what is essential. Sometimes it’s hard to be open-minded (even for the most liberal individuals), and to look beyond your own existence, but it’s important to remind yourself to shift perspectives, even on the most simple rituals. This conditioning has remained a dominate feature in guiding me in my life. It is what makes me a humanitarian.