Death, Society, and
Human Experience
9th Edition
Robert Kastenbaum
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Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
Chapter Twelve:
The Funeral Process
This multimedia product and its contents are protected under copyright law. The following are prohibited by law:
•Any public performance or display, including transmission of any image over a network;
•Preparation of any derivative work, including the extraction, in whole or in part, or any images;
•Any rental, lease, or lending of the program.
•
Copyright © Allyn & Bacon 2007
From Dead Body to Living Memory:
A Process Approach
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Premortem Preparations may include:
• Financial and employment matters
• Funeral arrangements
• Attention to personal relationships
•
Immediate Postdeath Activities
• Certification by a physician
• Contact relatives and friends
• Cleanse and wrap the body
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From Dead Body to Living Memory:
A Process Approach
•
Preparation for Burial or Cremation
• Allows for friends and relatives to gather
• Funeral arrangements must be make
• Insurance companies consulted
• Other financial arrangements made
• Allows time for embalming, mummification, or whatever
means the culture uses to preserve bodies
• Death must by certified by a physician
• Death certificate records are often missing potentially
important information
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From Dead Body to Living Memory:
A Process Approach
• The medical examiner (coroner) reviews the case
• Autopsy needed?
• Death investigator (medical specialist) needed?
• May involve an Autopsy
• Performed by the coroner or medical examiner
• Requires permission from the next of kin
• Sometimes needed to understand a condition that
poses a threat to the community
• Sometimes there is suspicion of negligence, error, or
homicide
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From Dead Body to Living Memory:
A Process Approach
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•
Settling into the Earth
• Most Americans are placed horizontally on their back
• Most common is fetal position (to sleep or be reborn)
Cremation
• Preferred by most ancient cultures (except Egyptians)
• Opposed by Christianity until the Reformation by Luther
• Some concern today over toxic gas emissions
• Utilized in the U.S. about 25% of the time, 63% of the
time in Europe, and 95% of the time in Japan
• Rare in Islamic counties, Israel, and sub-Saharan Africa
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From Dead Body to Living Memory:
A Process Approach
•
•
The Funeral Service
• Held for whole body burials and cremations
• Many decisions to be made in designing the ceremony
• Serves two purposes
• Final placement of the remains
• Public recognition of the death
Memorializing the Deceased
• Obituaries
• Grave markers
• Personal rituals, prayers, gifts, sacrifices
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What Does the
Funeral Process Accomplish?
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Create or solidify the place of a hero
• Ch’in, 1st Emperor of China, built a palace as a burial
tomb to support his claims to greatness and immortality,
secure succession, confound enemies, and impress
deities
• Queen Victoria created an elaborate funeral for Prince
Albert that symbolically incorporated him into the British
Empire and demonstrated the Victorian sentiment
• Lenin’s corpse was placed in a grand mausoleum as a
“patron saint,” even though he had no use for religion
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What Does the
Funeral Process Accomplish?
•
Balance the claims of the living and dead
• In Potamia, northern Greece, villagers (mostly the
women) tend temporary graves for 5 years, then bones
are transferred to the bone house
• The survivors are obligated to tend the graves
• Kotas, southern India, cremate the dead and carry out
two funerals, Green and Dry, for purification
• Orthodox Jews have a special time called Aninut,
devoted to honoring the dead and reflecting on the loss
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Cemeteries in the United States
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Colonial times
• Dead buried in churchyards or city cemeteries
• Quickly became crowded and chaotic
1796, New Haven Burying Ground
• Better planned; the first to offer “family plots”
Mount Auburn Cemetery, Cambridge, MA
• Introduced landscaped, park-like atmosphere
National Cemetery System for veterans
• President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (November 11,
1863) was given to dedicate the first national cemetery
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Cemeteries in the United States
•
Neighborhood Cemeteries
• Still active though some are in the midst of urban decay
•
Examples of Ethnic Cemeteries
• Afro-American Section, The Common Burying Ground,
Newport, Rhode Island
• Navajo and Mormon companions at the Ramah
Cemetery, Ramah, New Mexico
• Mexican-Americans in San Antonio’s San Fernando
Cemetery
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When Are the Dead
Important to the Living?
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•
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The dead are more secure in past-oriented societies
• Future-oriented societies may look to technology rather
than wisdom and achievements of the past
Geographical detachment from the dead will cause distress
to the living, especially in past-oriented societies
• Also disrupts their sense of tradition and culture
The dead will be remembered and “used” more often in
societies in which children are highly valued as continuing
the family soul over the gap created by death
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When Are the Dead
Important to the Living?
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•
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Longer life expectancy and low vested power of the elderly
make the dead less important
• More people are older (not unusual) and have fewer
resources
A society lacking unifying and transcending themes will
assimilate the funeral and memorialization process into its
utilitarian motives
• Dead may live on through organ donation rather than
memories, tradition, or social identity because of the
emphasis on function
Societies that live close to nature need the assistance of
the dead to promote fertility and regeneration
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Recent American Memorials
•
Vietnam Veterans Memorial
• Black stone suggests mourning and reflection
• Names are given in order of their deaths while rank,
unit, and home state were ignored
• Many people bring items to leave at the memorial
•
World War II Memorial
• Built after the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
• Took many years of advocacy and private fundraising
• Dedicated in 2004
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Recent American Memorials
•
World Trade Center Memorial
• Memorials have been established at the Pentagon and
in rural Pennsylvania
• Much discussion and controversy of the purpose and
design of the NYC memorial
•
Oklahoma City National Memorial
• Includes a chair in remembrance of all who died
• Includes a museum that charts the chain of events and
honors each individual who died with a personal object
• Includes an education and outreach service
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The Treatment of Human Remains:
The Vermillion Accord
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Universal respect shall be given to the mortal remains of
the dead
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Disposition of human remains will be made in accordance
with the wishes of the dead themselves whenever this is
known or can be reasonably inferred
•
The wishes of the local community will be respected
“whenever possible, reasonable, and lawful”
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The Treatment of Human Remains:
The Vermillion Accord
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The scientific value of studying human remains will be
respected whenever such value can be demonstrated to
exist
•
Negotiations with an attitude of mutual respect shall be
conducted to accommodate both the legitimate concerns of
communities for the proper disposition of their ancestors
and the legitimate concerns of science and education
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Challenges and Developments:
The Funeral Director’s Perspective
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Directors must pass licensure exams and be
knowledgeable in anatomy, chemistry, restorative art,
pathology, business, accounting, and some law
More women are becoming funeral directors
Funeral homes must give full price disclosure
Must get written consents for embalming
Typical service
• 20 to 40 minutes
• $6,000-$8,000 cost
• Music prelude, opening prayer, introductory remarks,
words from friends and family, clergy remarks, closing
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Alternatives to Traditional Funerals
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•
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Memorial Service (less formal, more personal in design)
Green Funerals
• Buried in biodegradable wrap placed in woodlands or
meadows
• Available U.S., more established in Europe
Virtual Memorials (on the internet)
• Tell the story of the person’s life (add photographs or
videos)
• Guest book that others can sign
• Most common - children who died of illness
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Spontaneous Memorials
•
A public, spontaneous response to a death, usually a
violent and unanticipated death
• Usually at the site of the death
• Usually occurs quickly after the death is announced in the
media
• Leave candles, mementoes, cards
• People often stay to reflect on the tragedy, and many will
return several times
• No one is left out, all can participate
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Examples of Abuse in the
Funeral Process
•
Tri-State Crematory in Georgia dumped 334 bodies while
giving families cement dust instead of ashes
• Tulane University’s School of Medicine sold bodies to the
U.S. Army for experiments with landmines
• UCLA Medical School sold cadaver parts to a broker who
sold them to commercial biomedical corporations
• Cadavers used as crash dummies in vehicle studies
• Cases of body harvesting to brokers
• Burial insurance industry overcharging and defrauding
black Americans
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Glossary: New Terms
•
Aninut
• Autopsy
• Cemetery
• Ch’iidii’
• Cremation
• Cryonic Suspension
• Death Certificate
• Death Investigator
• Embalming
• Eulogy
• Exhumation
• Funeral
•
Green Funeral
• Kaddish
• Obituary
• Organ Donation
• Ponos
• Postmortem
• Premortem
• Spontaneous
Memorialization
• Vermillion Accord
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