North America Week - Death and Mourning Customs Today happens to be the death anniversary of my mother, so I have been thinking about rituals and customs connected with death. What are some customs and rituals connected with death in your country or culture? There are many rituals connected with what people do with the dead body. There are also often rules about mourning (a time of showing ones sadness), especially connected with food and clothing. Do people bury bodies in the ground? Do they cremate them (burn them)? Are there special ceremonies some time after the death? Christians, Muslims, and Jews usually bury their dead. Hindus and Buddhists usually cremate their dead. But there are also variations within each of these groups. In some Arab countries there is an arabin, which comes from the Arabic word for forty. It is held 40 days after the death of someone. Many people get together and eat, and this is supposed to be the end of mourning. In December 2014, I lived in a small town in the Far West of Nepal. I noticed that maybe 5-10% of the people wore entirely white clothes.I found out that when someones mother or father dies, that person will wear only white clothing for a year. In the past in the US and many places in Europe, it was common for family members to wear black after the death of a close relative. Over the past century, this has become much less common. Eighty years ago in US movies, it was common to see people wearing black armbands, and it seems that this was common for a month or so after the death of a family member, but now this is very rare. When I lived in Boston in the 1980s, it was common to see old Italian women, mostly from the island of Sicily, who were wearing black. These were widows (women whose husbands had died). It was the custom then for widows to wear black for the rest of their lives. When I lived in India, the mother of my landlord died, and for the next year, he and his family did not participate in any celebrations. This was one sign of mourning. In Korea and Vietnam, it was common for families on special festival days to arrange a table with food, drink, and flowers and to have a ceremony to honor dead ancestors. Many parts of this custom come from China and are connected with Confucianism. In Cambodia, each September or October, there is a long holiday of about a week. People go to their villages and also hold ceremonies in which they honor their ancestors. In Chicago about twenty years ago, there was a very interesting exhibit of art from West Africa. I am not sure which country the art was from: maybe Senegal or Ghana. There were many special coffins (boxes for the dead body) on display. It has become common in this country to have coffins that show things that the person was interested in while alive. In Bali, an island in Indonesia, I saw a Ngaben (a cremation) in September 2011. This was a huge celebration. It happens several times each year and lasts about a week each time. On my Facebook page, I have some videos and photos about this festival. There was music, laughing, and also offerings of things that symbolized sources of happiness during that persons life. It was the most beautiful and moving death ritual that I have ever seen in my life.
Posted on: Sat, 24 Jan 2015 10:05:46 +0000
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