berghahn New York · Oxford

Contents

List of Figures

Introduction
Aubrey Thamann and Kalliopi M Christodoulaki

Part I: Delaying Death

Chapter 1. An Absent Presence: The Co-Constitution of Loss
Alison Witchard

Chapter 2. Immortality and Existential Terror: Learning the Language of Living Forever
Jeremy Cohen

Part II: Caregiving

Chapter 3. Living, Caring & Dying: Music and the House of Endless Losses
Carina Nandlal

Chapter 4. Death and Fulfillment: Mortuary Performance and the Impact on Self
Kalliopi M Christodoulaki

Part III: Confronting Death

Chapter 5. Crossroads: Life and Death in Indiana
Aubrey Thamann

Chapter 6. “What has the field done to you?” Researching Death, Dying, and Bereavement between Closeness and Distance
Ekkehard Coenen

Chapter 7. The Historical Study of Death & Dying: The Intersection of Familial Stories and Catholic Rituals
Sarah Nytroe

Part IV: Memorialization

Chapter 8. Touch ‘Em All: Memorializing Harmon Killebrew
Debbie Hanson

Chapter 9. After Life: Laying Flower Memes on My Mother’s Grave and the Recollective Realm of Life after Death
Olivia Guntarik and Claudia Bellote

Chapter 10. A Monumental Problem: Memorializing the Jonestown Dead
Rebecca Moore

Chapter 11. Long Live Chill #LLC: Exploring Grief, Memorial, & Ritual in African American R.I.P. T-shirt Culture
Kami Fletcher

Conclusion
Kalliopi M Christodoulaki and Aubrey Thamann

Index

Beyond the Veil

Reflexive Studies of Death and Dying

Edited by Aubrey Thamann and Kalliopi M Christodoulaki

256 pages, 14 illus., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-80073-064-9 Hb Published (May 2021)

eISBN 978-1-80539-435-8 eBook

Details

“…a wonderful edited collection I encourage any death scholar to read…I personally hope more volumes like this will emerge and that death scholars will continue to reflect about their subjective involvement in researching death as this makes for a richer field of study.” • Dead Good Reading

“The book takes a reflexive approach so that the authors contribute both scholarship and personal reflections… it works very well.” • Simon Shimshon Rubin, University of Haifa

“It’s good and interesting, with chapters that all have interesting things to say about matters of death and dying.” • Paul C. Rosenblatt, University of Minnesota

Looking at the cultural responses to death and dying, this collection explores the emotional aspects that death provokes in humans, whether it is disgust, fear, awe, sadness, anger, or even joy. Whereas most studies of death and dying treat the subject from an objective viewpoint, the scholars in this collection recognize their inherent connection with death which allows for a new and more personal form of study. More broadly, this collection suggests a new paradigm in the study of death and dying.

Aubrey Thamann is an American Studies scholar and anthropologist. Thamann has begun research into the fields of fat studies and food studies, specifically exploring where these fields intersect.

Kalliopi M Christodoulaki is a cultural anthropologist and independent researcher currently working as a Limited Term Lecturer at Purdue University. Her research interests include religious practices, social identity, and cultural change.

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Subject: Anthropology (General) Cultural Studies (General) Anthropology of Religion

Area:

LC: HQ1073 .B49 2021

BISAC: SOC002010 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/Cultural & Social; SOC036000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Death & Dying