William A. Douglass

Death in Murelaga is alright. It did what it set out to do, which was to study Murelaga's society through the context of funerals. Its conclusions (like most of anthropology's conclusions) weren't very exciting -- people are more interested in their families and neighbors than the village as a whole. The most interesting thing for me was the fact that these individuals (prior to 1964) carry out complex, year-long mourning rites on what were once the sepulchers of families -- but in which people are no longer buried. In a way, they're commemorating the dead of families to which they're not related. I'll have to talk about this phenomenon in my dissertation.… (meer)