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Anthropology 180
ANTHROPOLOGICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES ON DEATH
The city of the dead antedates the city of the living. In one sense, indeed, the city of the dead is the forerunner, almost the core, of every living city. Urban life spans the historic space between the earliest burial ground for dawn man and the final cemetery, the Necropolis, in which one civilization after another has met its end. (Lewis Mumford, in The City in History, p. 7)
DEATH. It is inevitable and usually unwelcome. Rich or poor, old or young, sooner or later we all face it. Death is the greatest of the life crises and since time immemorial all human societies have devised ways to cope with and explain it. Cultural responses to death are highly varied and tightly patterned. For instance, ancient people of Peru’s desert south coast wrapped their dead in bundles of textiles: the wealthier the deceased the greater the quantity and quality of cloth surrounding the flexed body. Ancient Egyptians believed in a good afterlife: the most powerful had their bodies preserved through embalming and were buried in great tombs, accompanied by much wealth. Indic kings in nineteenth century Bali went to the otherworld on a fiery pyre with as much pomp and ceremony as could be afforded. The Victorian Period in England was an era of comparative funerary excess in comparison to the simplicity of death rites and paraphernelia characteristic of Christian burials overall. Anthropologists and archaeologists take a keen professional interest in mortuary customs because of the information this culture-specific behavior can provide about the living society. The course provides a broad introduction to important theories, concepts and methodologies of the anthropological and archaeological study of death.
Readings
Required readings are on e-reserve.You also will be given handouts as required readings for the course. You are expected to do the required reading in time for each class session so that we can have meaningful discussions of the course material in class.
Requirements and basis of grading (% of final grade):
(1) 4 written film critiques = 40% (10% for each film – choose 4 of the 6 films you watch)
(2) Last Will and Testament = 10% (and be prepared to present its ideas in class)
(3) in-class discussion of Cemetery Project = 10%
(4) written-up Cemetery Project = 20%
(5) term paper = 20% (and be prepared to present the general ideas in class at end of term)
All written work must be double-spaced, 1” margins, 12-point font. You must staple the pages together (buy a stapler).
DID YOU KNOW?: THERE IS A MUSEUM OF FUNERAL CUSTOMS IN SPRINGFIELD, IL !
Assignments
Film Critiques
These are 2-3 page analyses of the films. Your critique should describe and analyze the attitudes toward death and the death practices portrayed. Discuss these making reference to the literature we’ve been reading and to the class lectures. The films are available for viewing in the Media

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Center of the Undergraduate Library. You may turn in your film critiques at any time prior to the discussion of the films in class, including at the beginning of that class session. Your critiques will not be accepted or graded after the discussion has taken place. The films are:
The Loved One:
My Girl:
The Funeral:
Soylent Green:
Between Two Worlds:
Truly, Deeply, Madly:
Last Will and Testament
Although you are very young, you’ve decided that Death can be capricious and you are going to spare your family added grief in the event of a tragedy. Therefore, you have made a LAST WILL
AND TESTAMENT. In this writing assignment I want you to inform your family about your desires for a funeral, casting your instructions within an anthropological and/or archaeological frame of reference/comparison, as if to justify your decisions. Where appropriate, integrate course material. You may bring in outside literature and experiences. Your WILL should be about 3-5 pages in length. To keep the flow of the essay, put any bibliographic references in endnotes at the end of the text. If you wish, you may write the will as if you had lived to be 90 years old or were someone else.
Be prepared to read or summarize your document in class.
Your WILL minimally should include the following information: how you wish your body to be treated from the moment of death and who should be dealing with your remains (all within the law), e.g. do you wish to be wearing a particular outfit or just a shroud (what kind, what material, etc.), have your hair done any particular way, makeup, jewelry, manicure, pedicure, body laid out flat or flexed, etc. a wake or an original pre-burial service (describe it): why or why you don’t desire this how you wish your body to be disposed of (interred but not embalmed, interred and embalmed, cremated but not embalmed, cremated and enbalmed, a freestanding mausoleum, a mausoleum crypt) if you choose interment or an above-ground crypt, what kind of coffin do you wish do you want a memorial service and, if so, what kind (describe it -- have you left any words to be read, who do you want to officiate, who would you like to have present, music, readings, prayers, dances, etc.) and where shall it be performed where do you want to be buried or, if cremated, what’s to be done with your ashes if buried, design your funerary monument/grave marker; if you choose cremation, do you want your ashes in a container and, if so, what kind (design it) do you wish to have an obituary appear in your local newspaper- if so, write it

3 do you wish people to send flowers to your family’s home or the funeral parlor or the cemetery what economic, social, religious, gender, age or other factors have intervened in your decisions
Term Paper
You must get my approval for your term paper topic. Please discuss it with me by the end of
September. You can e-mail me, if you wish. I would be pleased to read a paper outline and bibliography of the approved paper topic because this will keep you on track. You’ll know that your paper is feasible, its organization is acceptable and that the bibliographic resources exist.
Thus, you’ll be able to complete the paper on time.
Your paper should be about 10 pages in length, plus bibliography. I will teach you proper paper organization and citation form. The term paper is due five days after the last class session.
Cemetery Project
You will need to spend about four hours at the cemetery to get the data for the project. You may work with a partner. You may turn in a joint paper if you wish. You should go to the cemetery while the weather is good. We will discuss your preliminary results in class. This discussion will help you with the write-up of the data. You may turn in your written cemetery project at any time up to and including the last day of instruction. Here’s what you should do (or you can suggest a different kind of cemetery project to me):
1. Choose a period of time from the selection below.
1867-1880
1881-1890
1891-1900
1900-1910
1911-1920
1921-1930
2. Choose a sector of Mt. Hope from the selection below. See map, attached.
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9 14 20
10 15 21
11 16
B&F 14 19 8
3. Record a complete description of the tombstones in the chosen age group in your sector as follows. Be sure to tell me what sector and which age group you have chosen. a. Make a plan of the layout of the tombstones and arbitrarily number the tombstones on your plan b. Using the arbitrary numbers, copy down the information engraved on each tombstone. c. Make a freehand drawing of each tombstone. Indicate the tombstone dimensions on your drawing. Of what material is the tombstone made (porous grey rock, cast cement, etc.) Has the stone been left rugged or planed? on which sides? What is the shape of tombstone? Any

4 sculptural details such as an anchor, scroll, or lamb? Any religious iconography? Any iconography of group membership (e.g., Masons, Army, etc.)? Any separate markers of group membership? c. To what direction does the tombstone face (determined by the side that is inscribed)? Do you think the casket is oriented in the same way? d. Are there non-inscriptional carvings on the tombstone (i.e., imagery, iconography, e.g., a cross?). Draw these. e. What is the date of death of the tombstones immediately adjacent to yours? Make a little plan showing your tombstone in the middle and the date of death of the tombstones immediately around it. How close are the nearest tombstones to the N, E, S, and W? Is your person related to those buried around him/her f. If one of your tombstones is within a family plot, record the entire family plot. Is the style of tombstone same or does it vary within the plot? Draw a plan if your tombstone is part of a family plot. Is the plot demarcated by little rectangular blocks on whose top the first letter of the family name is carved? What kinship relationships, if any, can be established? (who is whose mother, son, brother, etc.) Does any tombstone serve more than one individual? (ex.: is SMITH written toward the top and Jenny written below and to the left and Sam written below and to the right?: this would probably be a husband-and-wife marker; others may have surviving children listed; etc.). g. What is the state of the tombstone? Is it in excellent condition, somewhat eroded, very eroded, eroded to the point that the inscription is illegible? Is it broken? Do you think that the state of the tombstone is related to raw material used and/or time elapsed or care received? h. Is the burial plot marked by something other than a tombstone (such as an inscribed bench, a sarcophagus, long slab, a mini-colonnade)? If so, measure, describe, and draw this. i. At home you will analyze your data. What do you infer about your individuals and east-central
Illinois society for the years encompassed by your study? Is there any kind of feature or quality that links the tombstones in your sector? Do they all pertain to individuals buried within a certain range of years? Are the tombstones all roughly equivalent in terms of nature/quality, assumed cost? Does your sector manifest a random filling-in process over time? Do any contiguous or nearby tombstones share the same family names? What kinship relationships can be established
(e.g., who is whose mother?) Is there anything that indicates a family plot? Does any tombstone serve more than one individual (i.e., a family marker)? What information could an archaeologist never recover archaeologically?
Order of lecture topics, required readings and classroom activities
INTRODUCTION
1. Greetings; course pragmatics.
2. Opening discussion. Why are you interested in the course topic? Why the professor is interested.

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ANTHROPOLOGICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
3. Why study death? Who studies death? Why and how archaeologists study death.
Anthropological and archaeology theories about death. Rites of passage: the concept as used by
Arnold van Gennep. Discussion of the many applications of the concept in our familiar life. readings
“Introduction” by S. C. Humphreys from Mortality and Immortality. The Anthropology and
Archaeology of Death
ETHNOGRAPHIC EXAMPLES
4. A rapid and grossly incomplete survey of ethnographically known funerary rites around the world to give you a sense of their immense diversity. “Compassionate cannibalism” in western
Brazil (Amazonia) into the 1950s. Video clip about funerary caskets in Ghana. readings
“Love me, miss me, eat me...” by D. W. Miller in TCHE, August 10, 2001
5. Día de los Muertos/Day of the Dead. If possible, video clip of the opening scene from John
Huston’s “Under the Volcano.” Video clip on Day of the Dead in Mexico. Slides.
readings
The Skeleton At The Feast. The Day of the Dead in Mexico by Elizabeth Carmichael and Chloë
Sayer [just skim the book to get an idea]
THE ANCIENT WORLD
6. Death in the ancient world. Egyptian mummification. Nasca trophy head taking (ancient
Peru). Aztec cannibalism (ancient Mexico). Slides. Overheads. readings
“Introduction: death and the regeneration of life” by Maurice Bloch and Jonathan Parry
“Understanding Aztec human sacrifice” by Patricia Anawalt
“A cache of 48 Nasca trophy heads from Cerro Carapo, Peru” by David Browne, Helaine
Silverman and Rubén García. Latin American Antiquity 43 (3): 274-294 [1993]
7. Looting the dead. Video clip from (A&E): “The Curse of King Tut” (VIDREC 932.014C938) readings
“The Peruvian gold rush” by Carl Nagin
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES
8. Premodern and nonmodern explanations of death. Megadeath: Black Death (compare to
AIDS). The Medieval “danse macabre.” readings
“The black death” by William Langer
9 and 10. Vampires. Voodoo. Death Incarnate. Ghosts. Video clips: Dracula (with Bela Lugosi);
The White Zombie OR Night of the Living Dead; The Serpent and the Rainbow readings
“Voodoo death” by Walter Cannon
“Voodoo death and the mechanism for dispatch of the dying...” by Harry Eastwell

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CEMETERIES
11 and 12. The evolution of the contemporary landscape of cemeteries. What can cemeteries tell us?
Case study 1: patterns of kinship and land tenure seen in cemeteries in Illinois.
Case study 2: ideology and social class seen in cemeteries of Broome County, NY. This lecture is preparation for the cemetery visit and your cemetery projects. readings
“Dialogues with the dead. Ideology and the cemetery” by Randall McGuire (pp. 441-457)
“From monument to place” by J. B. Jackson
“Mount Auburn and the rural-cemetery movement” by David Charles Sloane (ch. 3 in his book,
The Last Great Necessity . Johns Hopkins, 1991)
“The ideal cemetery: the memorial park” by David Charles Sloane (ch. 7 in his book, The Last
Great Necessity, Johns Hopkins, 1991)
13. Cemetery names. Tombstones. Epitaphs. This lecture also is preparation for the cemetery visit and your cemetery projects. Slides. Look at in class : copies of AGS Quarterly (Association for Gravestone Studies) readings
“A century and one-half of American epitaphs” by Michel Vovelle
“Early American gravestones” by Sherene Baugher and Frederick Winter
“A toponymic approach to the geography of American cemeteries” by Wilbur Zelinsky
14. An ethnoarchaeological approach to mortuary pattern analysis using the Heaven’s Gate mass suicide as the example for analysis. readings
Newsweek ’s cover story, “Follow Me. Inside the Heaven’s Gate Mass Suicide”
15 and 16. Tour of Mt. Hope Cemetery with professor. It is on the south side of campus, between Pennsylvania and Florida, walking due south from Davenport Hall. Meet me outside the entry to the Office and Chapel.
17. Virtual cemeteries. www.immortalized.com readings
“Coffins, urns and funeral service are going on line” (cyber services)
18 and 19. PRESENT YOUR LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT IN CLASS.
STATUS
20. Status in life and death.
Case study 1: Victorian England. Video clip about status and class conformity from “The Age of
Innocence” (Martin Scorcese’s version).
Case study 2: comparisons. readings
“Going in style. The role of fashion in ancient burial custom” by Aubrey Cannon
21. The space and place of death. Professor’s case studies of historic/modern cemeteries in Peru. readings
Introduction to The Space and Place of Death , edited by Helaine Silverman and David B. Small.

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(AP3A, volume 11, 2002), pp. 1-11
“Narratives of identity and history in modern cemeteries of Lima, Peru” by Helaine Silverman, in
The Space and Place of Death , pp. 167-190
“Rethinking the historical dimensions of mortuary practices: a case from Nisky Hill Cemetery,
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania” by David B. Small, in The Space and Place of Death , pp. 161-166
IDENTITY
22. National identity: Abraham Lincoln. readings
“Mourning and the making of a sacred symbol: Durkheim and the Lincoln assassination” by
Barry Schwartz
23. Ethnic identity. handouts
“Germans seek relatives in tour of area”
“Outward bound from the mosaic”
“A place for all eternity in their adopted land”
“The final mitzvah”
“The multicultural way of death”
24. African-American identity. African-American Cemetery in New York City and the concept of descendant communities. Video clip about African-American funerals in New Orleans. readings
“Who owns these bones?...” by John P. McCarthy
“Anatomy of an excavation. New York’s African cemetery” by Dominic Diongson
25. Diasporic identity.
Guest lecture by Dr. Martin Manalansan (Department of Anthropology, UIUC) on “Gender,
Memory and Death in the Filipino Diaspora”
26. Native American Indian dentity: NAGPRA. Kennewick Man. Video clip: “Science or
Sacrilege.” readings
“The violation of sepulture” by Valerie Talmage
“Burying American archaeology” by Clement Meighan
DEATH IN AMERICA TODAY
27 and 28. The value of life. The business of death, the humane servicing of the living: death in
America today. Slides. readings
“Working stiffs...” by Adam Davidson
“American attitudes toward death and dying” by Robert Marrone
“Exquisite corpses. The practice of everyday death in Seattle” by Diana George
“Cremation - selections from ChrisTina Leimer’s web site”
“Burn the all. Vaporizing the dead in a Fremont crematorium” by Phil Campbell
“At your disposal. The funeral industry prepares for boom times” by Judith Newman
“Last rites. When the existential becomes the retail” by Thomas Lynch
“Death, Incorporated” by Jessica Mitford

handouts
“Hot Type: Stephen Prothero’s Purified by Fire”
“The New Mausoleum of the Archangels”
“A cemetery should be forever” by John F. Llewellyn
“Socko Finish” by Thomas Lynch
“Men in Black” - review of Thomas Lynch’s book, The Undertaking
“Morgan plans to build new Savoy funeral home”
“Death becoing serious business in C-U”
“Mt. Hope Mausoluem. Non-Sectarian. Endowed Care”
“Introducing Woodlawn Cemetery’s New ‘The Garden of Sanctuary’”
“Public notice to all veterans”, “Grandview Memorial Gardens”
“Dear Champaign-Urbana Neighbors”
“Grandview Memorial Gradens and Woodlawn Cemetery”
“Daddy, Mommy, if you don’t make your cemetery arrangements, do I have to?” letter from Grandview Memorial Gardens
“Where the hearse it”, “Your whole life is leading up to this. Six Feet Under.”
“The perils of planning one’s own prepaid funeral”
29, 30 and 31. PRESENTATION OF YOUR CEMETERY PROJECTS
FILM DISCUSSIONS
32. Discussion of The Loved One
33. Guest lecture by funeral parlor director. handouts
“The Job Center. Funeral Director”
34. Discussion of My Girl
35. Discussion of The Funeral (note: this movie addresses many issues that are treated in
Hikaru Suzuki’s book, The Price of Death. The Funeral Industry in Contemporary Japan.
Stanford University Press, 2000)
36. Discussion of Soylent Green
37. Discussion of Between Two Worlds and Truly, Madly, Deeply
MEMORIALS AND MONUMENTS
38. Death and fame. Mourning the great. Princess Diana. Elvis Presley. readings
“Born a lady, became a princess, died a saint. The reaction to the death of Diana, Princess of
Wales” by C. W. Watson
“The death of a king: Elvis Presley” by Christine King
39 and 40. Monumentalizing death. Memory. World War II Memorial. Korean War Memorial.
Vietnam Memorial. Oklahoma City Memorial. readings
“Making the memorial” by Maya Lin
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“Memory, memorial and the Oklahoma city bombing” by Edward T. Linenthal
“Symbols of momentous times” by Kevin Keim
41. 911 and Ground Zero
42, 43, and 44. PRESENTATION OF YOUR TERM PAPER TOPICS.
COURSE SUMMARY
45. Course summary: Why do we care about death? handouts
“Death Got You Down?” by Elizabeth Himelfarb
“Final resting places: will there by room for you?” in Newsweek (March 24, 1997)
“Cemeteries. High-rise demise” in Sunday NYT Magazine (December 28, 1997)
“Family plot” by Vance Muse in Sunday NYT Magazine (July 13, 1997)
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