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Death, Mourning, and Burial
A Cross-Cultural Reader

"Robben has produced an outstanding collection of classic and contemporary essays on death and mourning. The carefully balanced selection and lucid introduction make this a superb teaching text." Michael Lambek, University of Toronto Scarborough, Canada


"This impressive combination of classic and very recent studies of how humans respond to death demonstrates anthropology's vibrant contribution to this field." Tony Walter, University of Bath, UK

Antonius C. G. M. Robben (Edited by), ACG Robben (Author)

9781119151746, Wiley

Paperback / softback, published 20 June 2017

368 pages
24.4 x 18.8 x 2 cm, 0.635 kg

The definitive reference on the anthropology of death and dying, expanded with new contributions covering everything from animal mourning to mortuary cannibalism

Few subjects stir the imagination more than the study of how people across cultures deal with death and dying. This expanded second edition of the internationally bestselling Death, Mourning, and Burial offers cross-cultural readings that span the period from dying to afterlife, considering approaches to this transition as a social process and exploring the great variations of cultural responses to death.  Exploring new content including organ transplantation, institutionalized care for the dying, HIV-AIDs, animal mourning, and biotechnology, this text retains classic readings from the first edition, and is enhanced by sixteen new articles and two new sections which provide increased breadth and depth for readers.

Death, Mourning, and Burial, Second Edition is divided into eight parts reflecting the social trajectory of death: conceptualizations of death; death, dying, and care; grief and mourning; mortuary rituals; and remembrance and regeneration. Sections are introduced through foundational texts which provide the ideal introduction to this diverse field.  It is essential reading for anyone concerned with issues of death and dying, as well as violence, terrorism, war, state terror, organ theft, and mortuary rituals.

  • A thoroughly revised edition of this classic anthology featuring twenty-three new articles, two new sections, and three reformulated sections
  • Updated to include current topics, including organ transplantation, institutionalized care for the dying, HIV-AIDs, animal mourning, and biotechnology
  • Must reading for anyone concerned with issues of death and dying, as well as violence, terrorism, war, state terror, organ theft, and mortuary rituals
  • Serves as a text for anthropology classes and provides a genuinely cross-cultural perspective to all those studying death and dying

Acknowledgments viii

Death and Anthropology: An Introduction 1
Antonius C. G. M. Robben

Part I Conceptualizations of Death 17

1 A Contribution to the Study of the Collective Representation of Death 19
Robert Hertz

2 The Rites of Passage 34
Arnold van Gennep

3 Symbolic Immortality 44
Robert Jay Lifton and Eric Olson

4 Remembering as Cultural Process 52
Elizabeth Hallam and Jenny Hockey

5 Massive Violent Death and Contested National Mourning in Post‐Authoritarian Chile and Argentina: A Sociocultural Application of the Dual Process Model 64
Antonius C. G. M. Robben

Part II Death, Dying, and Care 77

6 Magic, Science and Religion 79
Bronislaw Malinowski

7 Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande 83
E. E. Evans‐Pritchard

8 Living Cadavers and the Calculation of Death 90
Margaret Lock

9 All Eyes on Egypt: Islam and the Medical Use of Dead Bodies amidst Cairo’s Political Unrest 102
Sherine Hamdy

10 The Optimal Sacrifice: A Study of Voluntary Death among the Siberian Chukchi 115
Rane Willerslev

11 Love’s Labor Paid for: Gift and Commodity at the Threshold of Death 129
Ann Julienne Russ

Part III Grief and Mourning 149

12 The Andaman Islanders 151
A. R. Radcliffe‐Brown

13 Grief and a Headhunter’s Rage 156
Renato Rosaldo

14 Death Without Weeping 167
Nancy Scheper‐Hughes

15 Three Days for Weeping: Dreams, Emotions, and Death in the Peruvian Amazon 181
Glenn H. Shepard Jr.

16 The Expression of Grief in Monkeys, Apes, and Other Animals 202
Barbara J. King

Part IV Mortuary Rituals and Epidemics 209

17 Hunting the Ancestors: Death and Alliance in Wari’ Cannibalism 211
Beth A. Conklin

18 State Terror in the Netherworld: Disappearance and Reburial in Argentina 217
Antonius C. G. M. Robben

19 Mourning Becomes Eclectic: Death of Communal Practice in a Greek Cemetery 231
Diane O’Rourke

20 ‘We Are Tired of Mourning!’ The Economy of Death and Bereavement in a Time of AIDS 250
Liv Haram

Part V Remembrance and Regeneration 263

21 Ancestors as Elders in Africa 265
Igor Kopytoff

22 The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Mapuche Shaman: Remembering, Disremembering, and the Willful Transformation of Memory 276
Ana Mariella Bacigalupo

23 The Ghosts of War and the Spirit of Cosmopolitanism 293
Heonik Kwon

24 The Intimacy of Defeat: Exhumations in Contemporary Spain 306
Francisco Ferrandiz

Index 319

Subject Areas: Archaeology [HD]
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