ISBN:
9780262043816
Language:
English
Pages:
xliii, 222 Seiten
,
Illustrationen
DDC:
363.7/5
Keywords:
Mortuary Practice history
;
Technology history
;
Attitude to Death
;
Funeral Rites history
;
Cadaver
;
Thanatology history
;
Bestattungsritus
;
Leiche
;
Tod
;
Technologie
;
Geschichte
Abstract:
"How human technological interventions into death and the dead body since the nineteenth century have had a profound impact on today's (and future) end-of-life and human mortality realities. As Director of the Centre for Death and Society, the world's only interdisciplinary studies centre dedicated to researching death, dying, and the dead body, and the son of an American Funeral Director who grew up in the funeral industry, I am uniquely positioned to author a new book on the human corpse and technology. Death and the dead body are both extremely popular topics, and the books being currently published are tapping into that popular appeal. Most of these books, however, cover topics that remain perennially discussed. Indeed, it is striking how so many of the current books on death and dying reflect the same issues raised during the 1970's, a decade during which Publisher's Weekly enthusiastically told its readers "Death is now selling books!" A quick snapshot of some current(ish) death, dying, and dead body books includes, but is certainly not limited to: Mary Roach's Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, which was published in 2003 but remains widely read thirteen-years later; more recent books, such as Atul Gawande's Being Mortal, Caitlin Doughty's Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, and Brandy Schillace's Death's Summer Coat have all tapped into this popular genre. Books by academic authors such as Margaret Schwartz's Dead Matter and Thomas Laqueur's The Work of the Dead present historical and cultural contexts that are equally important. My listing of texts could exceed several pages but what is important about most contemporary death books is that the texts rarely give the history of publishing books on death much analysis. If any death-topic authors' names appear they are usually Jessica Mitford, Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, and Ernest Becker. Sigmund Freud sometimes appears (in connection to Becker) but on the whole these specific authors represent a fraction of the 'death canon.' What I am writing improves on these texts by presenting readers with a more complex and interesting history than most books on death, dying, and the dead body currently pursue. In a nutshell I present a longer view on how human technological interventions into death and the dead body since the nineteenth century have had a profound impact on today's (and future) end-of-life and human mortality realities. It is too easy to sum up most current books on death, dying, and the dead body ...
Description / Table of Contents:
Embalmed Vision -- The Happy Death Movement -- The HIV/AIDS Corpse -- Plastinating Taxonomies -- The Global Trade in Death, Dying and Human Body Parts -- Bioopolitics, Thanatopolitics, and Necropolitics -- Patenting Death -- Coda: Planning for Death
Note:
Literaturverzeichnis: Seite 199-212
