noahfor

I have to do a research paper on the death practices of a certain society. Does anyone know of any societies that have some really "out there" funeral practices, or attitudes about death contrary to western attitudes. For instance, a society in which people do not mourn their dead whatsoever or one that is just completely indifferent to death. Thanks.

BigBen

Ah, the ol' Help With a Paper.

How much money has the TFP stole from tutors across the land?

I would start with Wikipedia, and do some keyword searches regarding "Death" + "Rituals" or things like that.

Now, regarding your research style (asking TFP'ers to help, and wait patiently) I must assume that you are not too interested in the subject matter at hand.

In that case, might I point you to the ancient egyptians, whose pyramids were a device to help them take their wealth into the afterlife?

Might I talk about the ancient romans, and their stories about the River Styx and paying the Boatman for safe passage into the afterlife?

How about the Native American traditions, so numerous to mention that you could fill tombs of information (haha, use that in you paper; that pun will get you bonus marks) just comparing and contrasting the different rites.

It is true that the Inuit had set old tribe members on ice-floes to perish in times of severe hardship.

Others create pyres (bonfires) to burn the bodies. New Orleans cemetaries were composed of hundreds of crypts, since digging in the soil was out of the question.

The ancient Vikings set the body on a ship, set it ablaze, and pushed it out to sea.

Sailors use an ancient tradition of "Commiting the remains back to the sea" and throwing the body overboard. Just comparing Naval burial rites across time (or locations) would give you plenty of material for your required word-count...

Budhists wear different colours for mourning, and the contrast of colours compared to the Western attitude of "Black Widow" is interesting.

Don't Cajuns celebrate the life and have a party on their way to the cemetary?

Noahfor, I would love to be in your position. I enjoyed every moment of my studies, and soaked up as much knowledge as I could. Please appreciate the situation you are in, and act accordingly.

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BadNick

I just saw film of a Cajun funeral and everybody was having fun and partying to celebrate the old guys life ...that's one of my favorite funeral ideas. I seem to recall that maybe somewhere in the South Pacific, they also approach funerals as happy parties.

Another one I'm attached to, especially since I'm of Hungarian decent and on top of that, my dad was an artist and one of my favorite of all his paintings was of this subject ...Attila being buried. Since he was such a great hero of the Huns, when he died the legend says the Huns diverted the Danube River, dug a hug hole in the riverbed, built a majestic funeral pier on which they burned Attila's body, sacrificed his beloved magical horse and buried that with him, along with sacrificing hundreds of his brave soldiers who were buried with him too; then they let the river run it's natural course. Here's a postcard of my dad's painting:

noahfor

Thanks for the advice. I'm not asking for someone to do my paper or my research or anything, just to point me in the right direction. You're right though. I'm not intersted. I'd like to be proving something in this paper, but it seems like all they want from us are straight facts, and I'm not interested in that kind of stuff. I like theoretical phyics and philosophy and things of that sort. "Why" not "What", you know. Plus, I'm going through an incredibly antisocial period in my life, so I could care less what the hell people are doing about anything. Thanks though. I'll try to get something out of this.

Also, Badnick, that picture sounds interesting. I'd like to see it. I can't seem to find the link though.

kramus

I'm not sure if this is what you are after, but the practice of some citizens of India, who burn the corpses of their deceased loved ones beside holy river banks (notably the Ganges) has apparently had some possible impact on Europe. It would seem that there is a living to be made by some people who gather the carcasses of dead animals from the river and sell these remnants to various renderers. The renderers in turn make things such as bone meal, and animal feed products from the carcasses. In the past these products were shipped to Europe and fed to livestock. What is interesting is that there is a fair percentage of human remains included in the rendering. The human remains that end up included in the garnerings of the gatherers are due to an absence of enough firewood to completely consume a human corpse (apparently in the neighbourhood of 5 cubic feet of hardwood and 8-10 hours tended burning is needed) and the variations that a river has in it's flow (and subsequent clearing/moving of part-burned human remains from the riverbanks). These remains have thus entered the food chain of humans because people eat animals which have eaten the animal feed. Which may be an avenue of spongiform encephalitis infection in Western Europe.
I am only going from memory of a chance-read recent newspaper article but perhaps a google of assorted key bits of this story would turn up some hard facts for you.
If you are interested

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Ustwo

This one crazy society I know of, puts the dead in very expensive formal clothes and jewlery and then covers them in makeup. They then put them in a special made box which can cost a small fortune. They then buy the dead land in which to place this box in the ground (I assume to prevent theft of the jewlery/clothes/box).

Some cultures are just odd.

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noahfor

Is it the nacirema?

The thing about the ganges is interesting but not right for this paper. Thanks though. I think I'm going to do the yanomami tribe. They drink the remains of their cremated dead.

shakran

Woah. Holy crap. Stop the presses, Ustwo and I agree on something!


Yeah, I'm the same way. When I'm gone, as long as you don't let my body lay out in the open and poison something, I don't care what you do with me. Part me out to organ donations and burn what's left.

BadNick

hmmmm, I'm looking at the picture right now in my post above. I don't know why you can't see it. Maybe only Huns can see it? If you still want to see it and can't, PM me here with your email address and I'll email it to you ...I'm pretty sure normal "email noahfor" on this forum doesn't allow me to attach the jpg.

flat5

BadNick, apparently, a cookie is needed to view it.
We don't even see a link.