this post was submitted on 10 May 2024
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I don't care what happens to my corpse, because I'll be dead then. Never understood, why people still care nowadays, religion I guess.
Ritual and ceremony are deeply important aspects of the human experience. What cultures do with their dead is way, way up there with foodways and adornment when it comes to cultural significance.
The increasingly common view in the West that elaborate death rites are unimportant is really new when compared to the rest of human history. It's probably a postmodern thing? If I'm right about that, that would mean the less reverential attitude towards traditional deatg ceremony is like 110ish years old.
Compared to the 200,000-300,000 years Homo Sapiens have been around (or 45,000 years ago if we only want to discuss the length of time that Northern European-style deathways have most likely been practiced), 100 years isn't a lot to change that cultural inertia.
Sorry, I know this is a Wendy's. Just a frosty, thanks.
Why the fuck have you been downvoted, that's just a reasonable comment.
May I also point out, your funeral isn't for you. You might not care what happens to your body but your close ones do. A funeral is a place for them to find closure, to grief and mourn your loss. The mere fact that people who cannot retrieve their lost one's body feel awfully about it and still tend to create empty graves should show how much this is a very old desire of importance. The way we perform these death rituals can change and maybe it is not about how a body is being get rid off per se, and surely we could change this. That we as a species are aware of what death means and have found ways to cope with it (i.e. rituals as a coping way to deal with the knowledge) is incredible.
Whenever people say something along these lines of "just throw me in the trash" it feels to me like they didn't get that point. It's not about you. It's about everyone else.
Hey there! FYI I really appreciated this comment. The response to my comment here convinced me that Lemmy isn't really the place for me. I popped back today to look something up, and I wanted to make sure you got a friendly hello after seeing your response.
I totally agree with everything you said. Having shared practices for remembrance and an established "typical" way to demonstrate care for deceased people is a significant part of maintaining social cohesion and so useful for giving individuals an outlet for grief.
The way an entire industry has emerged to capitalize on loss and paij sickens me, but that part is a whole different conversation.
My education is in archaeoligy, and my primary interest was American deathways. I've probably spent more time thinking about contemporary death rites and remembrance than I've thought about anything else as an adult.
Anyway, I hope you're well! Keep on being a cool person.
This was such a nice reply, thank you, it really made my day (probably even two days). How sad that lemmy lost you, but I think I get it. It's not 100% my vibe either. Maybe one day it will change in a way that makes you want to try it out again. I'm probably typing this into a void but just in case you pop in again you, as well, deserve a friendly hello.
And I really hope you pop back in because frankly, having an archeologist who specialized in deathways is super interesting. I imagine you have so many things to tell. How are American deathways different from other cultures? What stands out? How did Native Americans influence the settling Europeans, and vice versa? Was there any influence to begin with? How did it change over time? What is the most heartfelt detail about how the dead were/are handled that might be special to that culture, in your opinion? What is the most grotesque aspect? How has your studies influenced how you view death itself, and how has it influenced your view on funerals? What would you do if you emigrated into a vastly different culture (in regards to last wishes etc)? What are the most common misconceptions, fun facts, and what touched you the most? And why exactly did you end up specializing in such a field anyway?
I realize I'm probably asking these questions into a void, but man, should you ever be back here - let me know how I can read up on your work, ok?
You remind me of a PhD candidate I met when working for theater and he was writing his thesis on Russian folklore fairy tales, and told me that he noticed a pattern of a circular repetition of themes in each story. I wish I remembered his name and were able to look up what he published, but I don't, and it saddens me that I missed out on such an interesting topic that I would have wanted to know more about. It seems like I will miss out once more. (Hey, is that a circular repeat?)
You can have the ceremony without being ripped off for thousands of dollars on a box nobody will ever see again