Being Dead Otherwise

Anne Allison

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English

Duke University Press
06 June 2023

Sociology: death & dying; Social & cultural anthropology

With an aging population, declining marriage and childbirth rates, and a rise in single households, more Japanese are living and dying alone. Many dead are no longer buried in traditional ancestral graves where descendants would tend their spirits, and individuals are increasingly taking on mortuary preparation for themselves. In Being Dead Otherwise Anne Allison examines the emergence of new death practices in Japan as the old customs of mortuary care are coming undone. She outlines the proliferation of new industries, services, initiatives, and businesses that offer alternative means---ranging from automated graves, collective grave sites, and crematoria to one-stop mortuary complexes and robotic priests---for tending to the dead. These new burial and ritual practices provide alternatives to long-standing traditions of burial and commemoration of the dead. In charting this shifting ecology of death, Allison outlines the potential of these solutions to radically reorient sociality in Japan in ways that will impact how we think about the end of life, identity, tradition, and culture in Japan and beyond.

By: Anne Allison
Imprint: Duke University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
Weight: 399g
ISBN: 9781478019848
ISBN 10: 1478019840
Pages: 256
Publication Date: 06 June 2023
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Prelude ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 Histories 1. Ambiguous Bones: Dead in the Past 25 2. The Popular Industry of Death: From Godzilla to the Ending Business 47 Preparations 3. Caring (Differently) for the Dead 73 4. Preparedness: A Biopolitics of Making Life Out of Death 99 Departures 5. The Smell of Lonely Death and the Work of Cleaning It Up 123 6. De-parting: The Handling of Remaindered Remains 149 Machines 7. Automated Graves: The Precarity and Prosthetics of Caring for the Dead 173 Epilogue 191 Notes 197 Bibliography 215 Index 231

Anne Allison is Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Duke University and author of Precarious Japan, also published by Duke University Press, Millennial Monsters: Japanese Toys and the Global Imagination, and Nightwork: Sexuality, Pleasure, and Corporate Masculinity in a Tokyo Hostess Club.

Reviews for Being Dead Otherwise

"""This is an extraordinary book. . . . Startling stories of mortician contests, robot Buddhist priests, and clean-up crews dealing with the odor of death illustrate change and the crisis of care in a society where good health care has made very old age a common experience, yet family and community have not kept up to provide solatia and death care for the increasing population of those in need. Highly recommended. Advanced undergraduates through faculty; professionals."" -- M. White * Choice *"