Marcia Cavell
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199287086
- eISBN:
- 9780191603921
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199287082.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Mind
This chapter discusses Freud’s thoughts about memory and the inter-related concepts of remembering, repeating, and working through. Freud believes that the present mind contains the past, though ...
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This chapter discusses Freud’s thoughts about memory and the inter-related concepts of remembering, repeating, and working through. Freud believes that the present mind contains the past, though often in unrecognizable form. Remembering — unlike its avoidance, repetition — allows for working through: clarifying, and integrating into the fabric of the mind, something previously warded off. The concepts of repression, remembering, repetition, working through, transference, and mourning together draw a conceptual map that Freud continually refined.Less
This chapter discusses Freud’s thoughts about memory and the inter-related concepts of remembering, repeating, and working through. Freud believes that the present mind contains the past, though often in unrecognizable form. Remembering — unlike its avoidance, repetition — allows for working through: clarifying, and integrating into the fabric of the mind, something previously warded off. The concepts of repression, remembering, repetition, working through, transference, and mourning together draw a conceptual map that Freud continually refined.
Saul M. Olyan
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199264865
- eISBN:
- 9780191698996
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199264865.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
This book offers an analysis of the ritual dimensions of biblical mourning rites. It also seeks to illuminate mourning's social dimensions through engagement with anthropological discussion of ...
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This book offers an analysis of the ritual dimensions of biblical mourning rites. It also seeks to illuminate mourning's social dimensions through engagement with anthropological discussion of mourning, from Hertz and van Gennep to contemporaries such as Metcalf and Huntington and Bloch and Parry. The book identifies four types of biblical mourning, and argues that mourning the dead is paradigmatic. It investigates why mourning can occur among petitioners in a sanctuary setting even given mourning's death associations; why certain texts proscribe some mourning rites (laceration and shaving) but not others; and why the mixing of the rites of mourning and rejoicing, normally incompatible, occurs in the same ritual in several biblical texts.Less
This book offers an analysis of the ritual dimensions of biblical mourning rites. It also seeks to illuminate mourning's social dimensions through engagement with anthropological discussion of mourning, from Hertz and van Gennep to contemporaries such as Metcalf and Huntington and Bloch and Parry. The book identifies four types of biblical mourning, and argues that mourning the dead is paradigmatic. It investigates why mourning can occur among petitioners in a sanctuary setting even given mourning's death associations; why certain texts proscribe some mourning rites (laceration and shaving) but not others; and why the mixing of the rites of mourning and rejoicing, normally incompatible, occurs in the same ritual in several biblical texts.
David Kyuman Kim
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195319828
- eISBN:
- 9780199785667
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195319828.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
This chapter examines Taylor's and Butler's accounts of melancholy and agency. It is argued that the form of melancholy shared by their accounts is a key feature of symbolic loss in the constitution ...
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This chapter examines Taylor's and Butler's accounts of melancholy and agency. It is argued that the form of melancholy shared by their accounts is a key feature of symbolic loss in the constitution of the self, and symbolic loss has a central role in creating the conditions for the possibility of new modes of agency. The convention in appropriating melancholy follows the comparative example Freud established between mourning and melancholia (melancholy), in which the character of loss and the reluctance to give up on an object of love in the latter (melancholia/melancholy) takes its lead and form from the former (mourning).Less
This chapter examines Taylor's and Butler's accounts of melancholy and agency. It is argued that the form of melancholy shared by their accounts is a key feature of symbolic loss in the constitution of the self, and symbolic loss has a central role in creating the conditions for the possibility of new modes of agency. The convention in appropriating melancholy follows the comparative example Freud established between mourning and melancholia (melancholy), in which the character of loss and the reluctance to give up on an object of love in the latter (melancholia/melancholy) takes its lead and form from the former (mourning).
Donald W. Shriver, Jr.
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195151534
- eISBN:
- 9780199785056
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195151534.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
Foreigners still wonder if Germans can really be trusted to remember the evils of Nazism. This chapter documents the array of public measures which the country has taken in the past 60 years to ...
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Foreigners still wonder if Germans can really be trusted to remember the evils of Nazism. This chapter documents the array of public measures which the country has taken in the past 60 years to educate its upcoming generations of citizens about those evils, with the hope, “Never again”. Documented here are the Holocaust memorials, anniversaries, museums, and school texts that have qualified Germany now as having established a “culture of memory” with few equals elsewhere in the world.Less
Foreigners still wonder if Germans can really be trusted to remember the evils of Nazism. This chapter documents the array of public measures which the country has taken in the past 60 years to educate its upcoming generations of citizens about those evils, with the hope, “Never again”. Documented here are the Holocaust memorials, anniversaries, museums, and school texts that have qualified Germany now as having established a “culture of memory” with few equals elsewhere in the world.
Donald W. Shriver, Jr.
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195151534
- eISBN:
- 9780199785056
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195151534.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter celebrates public occasions and measures in recent years where the American government and citizens’ groups acknowledged national “misdeeds” in international relations, especially in its ...
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This chapter celebrates public occasions and measures in recent years where the American government and citizens’ groups acknowledged national “misdeeds” in international relations, especially in its wars. The chapter begins with the 1998 Pentagon award of three soldiers’ medals to the helicopter crewmen who sought to call the My Lai massacre to a halt. It then describes recent presidential apologies for American failures to curb massacres in Bosnia and Rwanda. The author then nominates some still-to-be-acknowledged occasions for repentance in this country’s recent international affairs: the civilian-bombings of World War II, failures of public leaders to mourn — or even to count — the deaths of enemies in war, and the arrogance of American claims to global “full spectrum dominance”. The chapter concludes with pleas that America listen more carefully to its friendly critics in other countries, especially the two countries with which the book began: Germany and South Africa.Less
This chapter celebrates public occasions and measures in recent years where the American government and citizens’ groups acknowledged national “misdeeds” in international relations, especially in its wars. The chapter begins with the 1998 Pentagon award of three soldiers’ medals to the helicopter crewmen who sought to call the My Lai massacre to a halt. It then describes recent presidential apologies for American failures to curb massacres in Bosnia and Rwanda. The author then nominates some still-to-be-acknowledged occasions for repentance in this country’s recent international affairs: the civilian-bombings of World War II, failures of public leaders to mourn — or even to count — the deaths of enemies in war, and the arrogance of American claims to global “full spectrum dominance”. The chapter concludes with pleas that America listen more carefully to its friendly critics in other countries, especially the two countries with which the book began: Germany and South Africa.
Lynne Dale Halamish and Doron Hermoni
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- November 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195325379
- eISBN:
- 9780199999811
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195325379.003.0010
- Subject:
- Palliative Care, Patient Care and End-of-Life Decision Making, Palliative Medicine and Older People
This chapter discusses the factors to consider in taking children to funerals, describing the case of Naomi, who decided to take all her daughters to the funeral of her grandmother. It suggests that ...
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This chapter discusses the factors to consider in taking children to funerals, describing the case of Naomi, who decided to take all her daughters to the funeral of her grandmother. It suggests that it is important to take children to funerals and not to send them to school or kindergarten during the formal mourning period. The chapter also highlights the importance of explaining to children what they are expected to do at the funeral or formal mourning rituals.Less
This chapter discusses the factors to consider in taking children to funerals, describing the case of Naomi, who decided to take all her daughters to the funeral of her grandmother. It suggests that it is important to take children to funerals and not to send them to school or kindergarten during the formal mourning period. The chapter also highlights the importance of explaining to children what they are expected to do at the funeral or formal mourning rituals.
Lynne Dale Halamish and Doron Hermoni
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- November 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195325379
- eISBN:
- 9780199999811
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195325379.003.0024
- Subject:
- Palliative Care, Patient Care and End-of-Life Decision Making, Palliative Medicine and Older People
This chapter discusses the issue concerning who should be part of the mourning rituals. It describes the case of Edna, a woman in her seventies, who was having second thoughts about letting her ...
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This chapter discusses the issue concerning who should be part of the mourning rituals. It describes the case of Edna, a woman in her seventies, who was having second thoughts about letting her children attend the funeral of her husband or their father because of some conflict. The chapter suggests including as many people as possible in the support network in order to lessen the load on each grieving individual, and also to lesson the possibility of resentment between family members. All family members should attend the formal mourning rituals.Less
This chapter discusses the issue concerning who should be part of the mourning rituals. It describes the case of Edna, a woman in her seventies, who was having second thoughts about letting her children attend the funeral of her husband or their father because of some conflict. The chapter suggests including as many people as possible in the support network in order to lessen the load on each grieving individual, and also to lesson the possibility of resentment between family members. All family members should attend the formal mourning rituals.
Lynne Dale Halamish and Doron Hermoni
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- November 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195325379
- eISBN:
- 9780199999811
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195325379.003.0026
- Subject:
- Palliative Care, Patient Care and End-of-Life Decision Making, Palliative Medicine and Older People
This chapter discusses how to act appropriately around grieving individuals, describing the case of Shula, a mother grieving over the death of her son, and who received discouraging words from her ...
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This chapter discusses how to act appropriately around grieving individuals, describing the case of Shula, a mother grieving over the death of her son, and who received discouraging words from her so-called comforters. It explains that mourners are in a very vulnerable state following the death of their loved one and that things said lightly or thoughtlessly can be taken very hard. The chapter suggests that one appropriate way to enter a house of mourning is silently, and also provides recommended comforting words to say to a mourner.Less
This chapter discusses how to act appropriately around grieving individuals, describing the case of Shula, a mother grieving over the death of her son, and who received discouraging words from her so-called comforters. It explains that mourners are in a very vulnerable state following the death of their loved one and that things said lightly or thoughtlessly can be taken very hard. The chapter suggests that one appropriate way to enter a house of mourning is silently, and also provides recommended comforting words to say to a mourner.
Saul M. Olyan
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199264865
- eISBN:
- 9780191698996
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199264865.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
This chapter focuses on mourning the dead. All mourning behaviours function to separate the mourner ritually from society and the cult. The ritual separation of the mourner over the dead is ...
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This chapter focuses on mourning the dead. All mourning behaviours function to separate the mourner ritually from society and the cult. The ritual separation of the mourner over the dead is accomplished by distinct practices such as weeping, sitting on the ground, tossing ashes or dust upon the ground, and tearing of garments. The chapter also explores several aspects of mourning, aside from weeping and tearing of garments. Four interesting characteristics of mourning are: the length of the mourning period, the locus of mourning, the mourner's impurity, and the reversibility of mourning. The process of ritual separation may be aided by the activities of mourning professionals, often women, whose performance may illicit the appropriate ritual response from mourners and those who join them. The chapter concludes with the social dimensions of mourning as context for both social continuity and change.Less
This chapter focuses on mourning the dead. All mourning behaviours function to separate the mourner ritually from society and the cult. The ritual separation of the mourner over the dead is accomplished by distinct practices such as weeping, sitting on the ground, tossing ashes or dust upon the ground, and tearing of garments. The chapter also explores several aspects of mourning, aside from weeping and tearing of garments. Four interesting characteristics of mourning are: the length of the mourning period, the locus of mourning, the mourner's impurity, and the reversibility of mourning. The process of ritual separation may be aided by the activities of mourning professionals, often women, whose performance may illicit the appropriate ritual response from mourners and those who join them. The chapter concludes with the social dimensions of mourning as context for both social continuity and change.
Roland Enmarch
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780197265420
- eISBN:
- 9780191760471
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197265420.003.0006
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
‘Laments’ have long been recognised as an important and long-lived part of Egyptian written culture, appearing in widely differing contexts, including as captions to mourning scenes in tombs from the ...
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‘Laments’ have long been recognised as an important and long-lived part of Egyptian written culture, appearing in widely differing contexts, including as captions to mourning scenes in tombs from the Old Kingdom onwards, as liturgical laments uttered by Isis and Nephthys in mortuary texts, and as an important component of the literary style of Middle Egyptian pessimistic literature. The heterogeneous nature of these sources presents problems in arriving at a satisfactory definition for a ‘lament’ genre as a whole, and raises questions as to just how closely related these different written traditions are. While the style of literary laments in particular has often been described as originating from funerary dirges, the evidence for this is chronologically problematic and other generic influences have alternatively been posited. This chapter establishes stylistic and structural criteria to enable a more detailed analysis of the different kinds of lament, and their possible interrelationship.Less
‘Laments’ have long been recognised as an important and long-lived part of Egyptian written culture, appearing in widely differing contexts, including as captions to mourning scenes in tombs from the Old Kingdom onwards, as liturgical laments uttered by Isis and Nephthys in mortuary texts, and as an important component of the literary style of Middle Egyptian pessimistic literature. The heterogeneous nature of these sources presents problems in arriving at a satisfactory definition for a ‘lament’ genre as a whole, and raises questions as to just how closely related these different written traditions are. While the style of literary laments in particular has often been described as originating from funerary dirges, the evidence for this is chronologically problematic and other generic influences have alternatively been posited. This chapter establishes stylistic and structural criteria to enable a more detailed analysis of the different kinds of lament, and their possible interrelationship.
Saul M. Olyan
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199264865
- eISBN:
- 9780191698996
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199264865.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
This chapter is divided into three parts. The first section, ‘Mourning in Social Science Discussion’ tackles some of the more important anthropological research on mourning. The second section ...
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This chapter is divided into three parts. The first section, ‘Mourning in Social Science Discussion’ tackles some of the more important anthropological research on mourning. The second section ‘Mourning and Rejoicing as Ritual Oppositions’ describes the antithetical relationship of biblical mourning rites and rites of cultic rejoicing explained most effectively by G. A. Anderson. It adds further observations and relevant texts for consideration. The third section ‘Identifying Types of Mourning’ justifies the use of the use of term ‘mourning’ for ritual behaviours not directly linked to the death of an individual. It briefly looks into the points of contrast and similarity among the types of mourning, such as locus, presence or absence of pollution, time period, and ease of reversibility.Less
This chapter is divided into three parts. The first section, ‘Mourning in Social Science Discussion’ tackles some of the more important anthropological research on mourning. The second section ‘Mourning and Rejoicing as Ritual Oppositions’ describes the antithetical relationship of biblical mourning rites and rites of cultic rejoicing explained most effectively by G. A. Anderson. It adds further observations and relevant texts for consideration. The third section ‘Identifying Types of Mourning’ justifies the use of the use of term ‘mourning’ for ritual behaviours not directly linked to the death of an individual. It briefly looks into the points of contrast and similarity among the types of mourning, such as locus, presence or absence of pollution, time period, and ease of reversibility.
Geoffrey Bennington
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748639854
- eISBN:
- 9780748652105
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748639854.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This book gathers work written by Geoffrey Bennington since the death of his friend Jacques Derrida in 2004. All, with significant variations of depth, manner and tone dictated by the different ...
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This book gathers work written by Geoffrey Bennington since the death of his friend Jacques Derrida in 2004. All, with significant variations of depth, manner and tone dictated by the different circumstances for which they were written, continue the ongoing work of elucidating difficult and complex thought, often enough with reference to Derrida's persistent interrogation of the concepts of life and death, mourning and melancholia, and what he sometimes calls ‘half-mourning’. This is a kind of mourning not so much ‘failed’ as suspended in the name of mourning itself, an ‘ethical’ interruption of the drive to complete mourning (the drive to get over it and get back to oneself and back to work), an interruption that this book relates to the persistent but still ill-understood motif of interrupted teleology, which, it is argued here, is definitive of deconstruction in general. This suspension or interruption of the end (which is none other than différance ‘itself’ holding difference short of opposition and its dialectical totalisation, so that différance is always not half difference, less than absolute) has all manner of consequences for our thinking, and for how we attempt to categorize that thinking (as epistemological, ethical, political or aesthetic, for example). The book moves through all these domains, and the whole of Derrida's rich and varied corpus, in a weave or scatter of styles, from the expository and analytic to the autobiographical and the confessional, in the ongoing process of deconstruction.Less
This book gathers work written by Geoffrey Bennington since the death of his friend Jacques Derrida in 2004. All, with significant variations of depth, manner and tone dictated by the different circumstances for which they were written, continue the ongoing work of elucidating difficult and complex thought, often enough with reference to Derrida's persistent interrogation of the concepts of life and death, mourning and melancholia, and what he sometimes calls ‘half-mourning’. This is a kind of mourning not so much ‘failed’ as suspended in the name of mourning itself, an ‘ethical’ interruption of the drive to complete mourning (the drive to get over it and get back to oneself and back to work), an interruption that this book relates to the persistent but still ill-understood motif of interrupted teleology, which, it is argued here, is definitive of deconstruction in general. This suspension or interruption of the end (which is none other than différance ‘itself’ holding difference short of opposition and its dialectical totalisation, so that différance is always not half difference, less than absolute) has all manner of consequences for our thinking, and for how we attempt to categorize that thinking (as epistemological, ethical, political or aesthetic, for example). The book moves through all these domains, and the whole of Derrida's rich and varied corpus, in a weave or scatter of styles, from the expository and analytic to the autobiographical and the confessional, in the ongoing process of deconstruction.
A. L. Epstein
- Published in print:
- 1992
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520075627
- eISBN:
- 9780520911642
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520075627.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
The Tolai are among the most distinctive of Papua New Guinea's indigenous peoples. For all their success in the pursuit of modernity, they remain traditional in their attitudes toward death, the ...
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The Tolai are among the most distinctive of Papua New Guinea's indigenous peoples. For all their success in the pursuit of modernity, they remain traditional in their attitudes toward death, the cultural elaboration of which colors almost every aspect of their existence. This book develops an emotional profile of the Tolai, contending that societies are distinguished as much by the shape of their emotional life as they are by their social arrangements and cultural styles. It describes a wide range of mourning ceremonies and other more and less public occasions. By investigating not only the words that stand for emotions but also the way affect enters into and informs people's conduct, the book charts a new course for ethnography that seeks to integrate the study of the emotions into anthropological analysis.Less
The Tolai are among the most distinctive of Papua New Guinea's indigenous peoples. For all their success in the pursuit of modernity, they remain traditional in their attitudes toward death, the cultural elaboration of which colors almost every aspect of their existence. This book develops an emotional profile of the Tolai, contending that societies are distinguished as much by the shape of their emotional life as they are by their social arrangements and cultural styles. It describes a wide range of mourning ceremonies and other more and less public occasions. By investigating not only the words that stand for emotions but also the way affect enters into and informs people's conduct, the book charts a new course for ethnography that seeks to integrate the study of the emotions into anthropological analysis.
Peggy Kamuf
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748641543
- eISBN:
- 9780748652136
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748641543.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This book collects ten years of Peggy Kamuf's writing on the work and friendship of Jacques Derrida. The majority of the chapters discuss a key aspect of Derrida's thought, either from a single work ...
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This book collects ten years of Peggy Kamuf's writing on the work and friendship of Jacques Derrida. The majority of the chapters discuss a key aspect of Derrida's thought, either from a single work or across several texts. Kamuf engages with a broad array of his work, from the 1960s to the posthumous publication of his teaching seminars, and also considers press interviews and their collaboration on a film. These close readings are punctuated by brief recollections from their long friendship. The chapters trace a reflection that undergoes the sudden event of Derrida's death. Rather than take this interruption as its premise, however, the book sets out from Derrida's own teaching that mourning begins with friendship and not just at the death of the friend. Thus, the strict chronology of the chapters, from 2000 to 2010, highlights a general illusion of ‘before’ and ‘after’ that comes undone over the course of the sequence.Less
This book collects ten years of Peggy Kamuf's writing on the work and friendship of Jacques Derrida. The majority of the chapters discuss a key aspect of Derrida's thought, either from a single work or across several texts. Kamuf engages with a broad array of his work, from the 1960s to the posthumous publication of his teaching seminars, and also considers press interviews and their collaboration on a film. These close readings are punctuated by brief recollections from their long friendship. The chapters trace a reflection that undergoes the sudden event of Derrida's death. Rather than take this interruption as its premise, however, the book sets out from Derrida's own teaching that mourning begins with friendship and not just at the death of the friend. Thus, the strict chronology of the chapters, from 2000 to 2010, highlights a general illusion of ‘before’ and ‘after’ that comes undone over the course of the sequence.
Arnold Krupat
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801451386
- eISBN:
- 9780801465857
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801451386.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Native American Studies
The word “elegy” comes from the Ancient Greek elogos, meaning a mournful poem or song, in particular a song of grief in response to loss. Because mourning and memorialization are so deeply embedded ...
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The word “elegy” comes from the Ancient Greek elogos, meaning a mournful poem or song, in particular a song of grief in response to loss. Because mourning and memorialization are so deeply embedded in the human condition, all human societies have developed means for lamenting the dead, and, this book surveys the traditions of Native American elegiac expression over several centuries. The book covers a variety of oral performances of loss and renewal, including the Condolence Rites of the Iroquois and the memorial ceremony of the Tlingit people known as koo'eex, examining as well a number of Ghost Dance songs, which have been reinterpreted in culturally specific ways by many different tribal nations. The book treats elegiac “farewell” speeches of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in considerable detail, and comments on retrospective autobiographies by Black Hawk and Black Elk. Among contemporary Native writers, it looks at elegiac work by Linda Hogan, N. Scott Momaday, Gerald Vizenor, Sherman Alexie, Maurice Kenny, and Ralph Salisbury, among others. Despite differences of language and culture, the book finds that death and loss are consistently felt by Native Americans both personally and socially: someone who had contributed to the People's well-being was now gone. Native American elegiac expression offered mourners consolation so that they might overcome their grief and renew their will to sustain communal life.Less
The word “elegy” comes from the Ancient Greek elogos, meaning a mournful poem or song, in particular a song of grief in response to loss. Because mourning and memorialization are so deeply embedded in the human condition, all human societies have developed means for lamenting the dead, and, this book surveys the traditions of Native American elegiac expression over several centuries. The book covers a variety of oral performances of loss and renewal, including the Condolence Rites of the Iroquois and the memorial ceremony of the Tlingit people known as koo'eex, examining as well a number of Ghost Dance songs, which have been reinterpreted in culturally specific ways by many different tribal nations. The book treats elegiac “farewell” speeches of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in considerable detail, and comments on retrospective autobiographies by Black Hawk and Black Elk. Among contemporary Native writers, it looks at elegiac work by Linda Hogan, N. Scott Momaday, Gerald Vizenor, Sherman Alexie, Maurice Kenny, and Ralph Salisbury, among others. Despite differences of language and culture, the book finds that death and loss are consistently felt by Native Americans both personally and socially: someone who had contributed to the People's well-being was now gone. Native American elegiac expression offered mourners consolation so that they might overcome their grief and renew their will to sustain communal life.
Robert Wyatt and John Andrew Johnson
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195327113
- eISBN:
- 9780199851249
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195327113.003.0071
- Subject:
- Music, Popular
This chapter presents the text of a series of daily reports about the funeral of George Gershwin which were published in Variety magazine. The reports provide detailed accounts of the situation, ...
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This chapter presents the text of a series of daily reports about the funeral of George Gershwin which were published in Variety magazine. The reports provide detailed accounts of the situation, preparations, and services following Gershwin's death. One report notes that about 4,000 mourners defied the rain to attend the funeral services at Temple Emanu-El in New York and another report that the grieving in both the East and West Coast in the US.Less
This chapter presents the text of a series of daily reports about the funeral of George Gershwin which were published in Variety magazine. The reports provide detailed accounts of the situation, preparations, and services following Gershwin's death. One report notes that about 4,000 mourners defied the rain to attend the funeral services at Temple Emanu-El in New York and another report that the grieving in both the East and West Coast in the US.
Cathy Gutierrez
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195388350
- eISBN:
- 9780199866472
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195388350.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter explores Victorian ideas of memory and mourning in America and argues that shifts in religious concepts regarding the saved and the damned accounted for a dramatic increase in the ...
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This chapter explores Victorian ideas of memory and mourning in America and argues that shifts in religious concepts regarding the saved and the damned accounted for a dramatic increase in the centrality of memory. As the grieving were expected to demonstrate their continued memory of a loved one and funerals moved into the marketplace, Spiritualists wrestled with the problem of memory as a potential enemy of progress. Taking their cue from Emanuel Swedenborg’s writing, Spiritualists determined that memory was an instrument of ethics—having dispensed with hell, Spiritualism needed some form of retribution in the afterlife. Memory punished the evildoers and spurred them toward progress. Renaissance ideals of memory theatres were revived but inverted in Spiritualist heavens: the dead needed to forget their vanities and misdeeds in order to move on.Less
This chapter explores Victorian ideas of memory and mourning in America and argues that shifts in religious concepts regarding the saved and the damned accounted for a dramatic increase in the centrality of memory. As the grieving were expected to demonstrate their continued memory of a loved one and funerals moved into the marketplace, Spiritualists wrestled with the problem of memory as a potential enemy of progress. Taking their cue from Emanuel Swedenborg’s writing, Spiritualists determined that memory was an instrument of ethics—having dispensed with hell, Spiritualism needed some form of retribution in the afterlife. Memory punished the evildoers and spurred them toward progress. Renaissance ideals of memory theatres were revived but inverted in Spiritualist heavens: the dead needed to forget their vanities and misdeeds in order to move on.
Tania Oldenhage
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195150520
- eISBN:
- 9780199834549
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019515052X.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Biblical Studies
Historicizes Joachim Jeremias's work on the parables of Jesus and its anti‐Jewish rhetoric by attending to the time and place of the book's first publication, Germany in 1947. Oldenhage shows that ...
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Historicizes Joachim Jeremias's work on the parables of Jesus and its anti‐Jewish rhetoric by attending to the time and place of the book's first publication, Germany in 1947. Oldenhage shows that the book is symptomatic not so much of Christian anti‐Judaism in general but, much more specifically, of the difficulties of responding to the Holocaust in Germany shortly after the events. The chapter draws from Alexander and Margarete Mitscherlichs's thesis of an “inability to mourn” as well as from more recent discussions of German responses to the Holocaust.Less
Historicizes Joachim Jeremias's work on the parables of Jesus and its anti‐Jewish rhetoric by attending to the time and place of the book's first publication, Germany in 1947. Oldenhage shows that the book is symptomatic not so much of Christian anti‐Judaism in general but, much more specifically, of the difficulties of responding to the Holocaust in Germany shortly after the events. The chapter draws from Alexander and Margarete Mitscherlichs's thesis of an “inability to mourn” as well as from more recent discussions of German responses to the Holocaust.
Olga Taxidou
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748619870
- eISBN:
- 9780748651719
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748619870.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century and Contemporary Literature
This reinterpretation of Greek tragedy focuses on the performative – the physical and civic – dimension of tragedy. It challenges the idealist, humanist, and universalist approaches that have ...
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This reinterpretation of Greek tragedy focuses on the performative – the physical and civic – dimension of tragedy. It challenges the idealist, humanist, and universalist approaches that have informed our most cherished philosophical, psychoanalytical, and modern interpretations of Greek tragedy and, in so doing, asks us to renew our relation to these works and to our literary and philosophical inheritance. The book reassesses tragic form in relation to Athenian democracy and links it with a performative discourse that both excludes the feminine and relies on civic and private forms of mourning. At the same time, it explores the centrality of tragedy for thinkers of Modernity such as Hölderlin, Nietzsche, Hegel, Freud, Brecht, and Benjamin. Through a persuasive analysis of both classical theorists – Plato and Aristotle – and modern theorists – Benjamin, Lacan, Kristeva, Derrida, and Butler – the book significantly shifts the emphasis from a Sophoclean model of tragedy to a Euripidean one. Close readings of the performative aspects of Greek play texts help illuminate these ideas.Less
This reinterpretation of Greek tragedy focuses on the performative – the physical and civic – dimension of tragedy. It challenges the idealist, humanist, and universalist approaches that have informed our most cherished philosophical, psychoanalytical, and modern interpretations of Greek tragedy and, in so doing, asks us to renew our relation to these works and to our literary and philosophical inheritance. The book reassesses tragic form in relation to Athenian democracy and links it with a performative discourse that both excludes the feminine and relies on civic and private forms of mourning. At the same time, it explores the centrality of tragedy for thinkers of Modernity such as Hölderlin, Nietzsche, Hegel, Freud, Brecht, and Benjamin. Through a persuasive analysis of both classical theorists – Plato and Aristotle – and modern theorists – Benjamin, Lacan, Kristeva, Derrida, and Butler – the book significantly shifts the emphasis from a Sophoclean model of tragedy to a Euripidean one. Close readings of the performative aspects of Greek play texts help illuminate these ideas.
Beth A. Berkowitz
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195179194
- eISBN:
- 9780199784509
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195179196.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter completes the study of the cast of characters found in rabbinic execution, turning attention to the criminal’s relatives and to the role of the Rabbis themselves. In exploring the part ...
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This chapter completes the study of the cast of characters found in rabbinic execution, turning attention to the criminal’s relatives and to the role of the Rabbis themselves. In exploring the part of the relatives, it extricates the relevant passages of Mishnah from their accepted interpretation by the Babylonian Talmud to show that the criminal is permanently buried in a location separate from the family burial site. It argues that the Mishnah’s laws prescribing separate burial, prohibiting the relatives from mourning, and requiring the relatives to reconcile with the court are all means of asserting the primacy of the rabbinic community over the bonds of family. Finally, the chapter examines narratives in which sages are portrayed as agents of execution. It shows that these stories project the power of execution onto the Rabbis, but also evince a strategic ambivalence about that power.Less
This chapter completes the study of the cast of characters found in rabbinic execution, turning attention to the criminal’s relatives and to the role of the Rabbis themselves. In exploring the part of the relatives, it extricates the relevant passages of Mishnah from their accepted interpretation by the Babylonian Talmud to show that the criminal is permanently buried in a location separate from the family burial site. It argues that the Mishnah’s laws prescribing separate burial, prohibiting the relatives from mourning, and requiring the relatives to reconcile with the court are all means of asserting the primacy of the rabbinic community over the bonds of family. Finally, the chapter examines narratives in which sages are portrayed as agents of execution. It shows that these stories project the power of execution onto the Rabbis, but also evince a strategic ambivalence about that power.
