Culture

In the Final Research Paper, you will

Describe an aspect of your own culture from an etic (outsider’s) perspective in Part I of the paper.
Describe an aspect of another culture from an emic (insider’s) perspective in Part II of the paper.
Apply cultural relativism in order to examine misconceptions about culture that may occur due to ethnocentrism.
Keep the distinction between cultural relativism and moral relativism in mind as you write your final paper.
Even if you do not personally agree with a cultural practice, explain how the practice makes sense in its cultural context.
Avoid opinionated or judgmental language in your paper.
Analyze your chosen aspect in terms of how it developed as part of a social system within both your culture and another culture.
Analyze your chosen aspect in terms of its purpose as part of a social system both within your own culture and another culture.

The Final Research Paper

Must be five to six double-spaced pages in length (excluding title page and references page, meaning it will be seven to eight pages total), and formatted according to APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center’s APA Style (Links to an external site.).
Must include a separate title page with the following:
Title of paper
Student’s name
Course name and number
Instructor’s name
Date submitted
For further assistance with the formatting and the title page, refer to APA Formatting for Word 2013 (Links to an external site.).
Must utilize academic voice. See the Academic Voice (Links to an external site.) resource for additional guidance.
Must include an introduction and conclusion paragraph. Your introduction paragraph needs to end with a clear thesis statement that indicates the purpose of your paper.
For assistance on writing Introductions & Conclusions (Links to an external site.) as well as Writing a Thesis Statement (Links to an external site.), refer to the Ashford Writing Center resources.
Must include at least one full-text scholarly resource ideally from the Ashford University Library in addition to the textbook, the Miner article, and the article chosen from the List of Topics (Links to an external site.) in Part II of the Week 3 assignment.
The Scholarly, Peer Reviewed, and Other Credible Sources (Links to an external site.) table offers additional guidance on appropriate source types. If you have questions about whether a specific source is appropriate for this assignment, please contact your instructor. Your instructor has the final say about the appropriateness of a specific source for a particular assignment.
Must document any information used from sources in APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center’s Citing Within Your Paper (Links to an external site.)
Must include a separate references page that is formatted according to APA style as outlined in the Ashford Writing Center. See the Formatting Your References List (Links to an external site.) resource in the Ashford Writing Center for specifications. The two sources to utilize are:

Martínez, D. (2004). The Soul of the Indian: Lakota Philosophy and the Vision Quest. Wicazo Sa Review, 19(2), 79-104.

Tsuji, Y. (2011). Rites of passage to death and afterlife in Japan. Generations Journal of the American Society on Aging, 35(3), 28-33. Retrieved from the EBSCOhost database.