Rituals Around Life and Death in Mexico; The Day of the Dead

2019 ◽  
pp. 225-242
Author(s):  
Adelina Arredondo ◽  
Cristina Casillas
Keyword(s):  
Life And Death ◽  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
The Dead

Horror and Death: Rethinking Coco's Border Politics

2020 ◽  
Vol 73 (4) ◽  
pp. 41-49
Author(s):  
Orquidea Morales
Keyword(s):  
The United States ◽  
Horror Film ◽  
Walt Disney Company ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Walt Disney ◽  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
Animated Film ◽  
Border Politics ◽  
The Dead ◽  
The U.S

In 2013, the Walt Disney Company submitted an application to trademark “Día de los muertos” (Day of the Dead) as they prepared to launch a holiday themed movie. Almost immediately after this became public Disney faced such strong criticism and backlash they withdrew their petition. By October of 2017 Disney/Pixar released the animated film Coco. Audiences in Mexico and the U.S. praised it's accurate and authentic representation of the celebration of Day of the Dead. In this essay, I argue that despite its generic framing, Coco mobilizes many elements of horror in its account of Miguel's trespassing into the forbidden space of the dead and his transformation into a liminal figure, both dead and alive. Specifically, with its horror so deftly deployed through tropes and images of borders, whether between life and death or the United States and Mexico, Coco falls within a new genre, the border horror film.

The Day of the Dead: Celebrating the Continuity of Life and Death

Liturgy ◽  
1997 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
RaúL Gómez
Keyword(s):  
Life And Death ◽  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
The Dead

scholarly journals Immersion Through Culture: Representations of the “Day of the Dead” in Film

2020 ◽  
pp. 61-78
Author(s):  
Giorgos Dimitriadis ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Visual Metaphor ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Sergei Eisenstein ◽  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
Sam Mendes ◽  
Cultural Element ◽  
Dia De Los Muertos ◽  
The Dead ◽  
The Way

The Mexican celebration of the “Day of the Dead” (Día de Muertos or Día de los Muertos) has been recurrently used in film, with three of the most notable examples ranging from the recent Coco (Lee Unkrich and Adrian Molina, 2017) and Spectre (Sam Mendes, 2015), all the way back to the surviving footage of ¡Que Viva Mexico! (Sergei Eisenstein, 1931, unfinished). Though vastly different from one another in almost every respect, all three cases explore the topic of “in-between” both thematically and technically: the celebration that merges life and death becomes a visual metaphor and a tool for filmmakers to explore the ways in which film technique creates overlapping areas between cinema and reality. In each film, a visually powerful cultural asset such as the “Day of the Dead,” is combined with different aspects of film technique, explicitly, but differently, appealing to a kind of sensory immersion in order to attract viewers inside its world. By doing so, the “Day of the Dead” exemplifies the ways in which a common cultural element can help translate the personal visions of different filmmakers into distinct filmic events.

BLINDNESS AS THE THRESHOLD BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH IN SENECA'S OEDIPVS AND PHOENISSAE

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Ricardo Duarte
Keyword(s):  
Thought Processes ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Self Knowledge ◽  
The Dead

Abstract This article looks at the complexity of the thought processes that lead Seneca's Oedipus to choose the mors longa of blindness as punishment for his crime (in his blindness, he is to live in a kind of ostracism, separately from both the living and the dead). It offers an analysis of the consolation of this existence on the threshold between life and death, notably with reference to the end of the Oedipus, but also of the sorrow of this liminal existence. The latter is described in Seneca's Phoenissae, which suggests an escape, by death stricto sensu, from the threshold represented by blindness, by which Oedipus now feels trapped. By examining these three topics, the article shows how the threshold between life and death which Oedipus chooses at the end of Seneca's Oedipus and experiences in the Phoenissae mirrors the ambivalence and the errors of his life before he blinded himself. Ultimately, it also illustrates Oedipus’ continuing failure to achieve self-knowledge.

Day of the Dead

Grand Street ◽  
1993 ◽  
pp. 132
Author(s):  
Stacey Land Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
The Dead

scholarly journals The disorderly body: considerations of The Book of Numbers, 19 and ritual impurity after contact with a corpse

2011 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 197-205
Author(s):  
Sandra Junker
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Human Body ◽  
The Body ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Dead Body ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Living Body ◽  
The People ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Living Creature

This article deals with the idea of ritual bodily impurity after coming into contact with a corpse in the Hebrew Bible. The evanescence and impermanence of the human body testifies to the mortality of the human being. In that way, the human body symbolizes both life and death at the same time; both conditions are perceivable in it. In Judaism, the dead body is considered as ritually impure. Although, in this context it might be better to substitute the term ‘ritually damaged’ for ‘ritually impure’: ritual impurity does not refer to hygienic or moral impurity, but rather to an incapability of exercising—and living—religion. Ritual purity is considered as a prerequisite for the execution of ritual acts and obligations. The dead body depends on a sphere which causes the greatest uncertainty because it is not accessible for the living. According to Mary Douglas’s concepts, the dead body is considered ritually impure because it does not answer to the imagined order anymore, or rather because it cannot take part in this order anymore. This is impurity imagined as a kind of contagious illness, which is carried by the body. This article deals with the ritual of the red heifer in Numbers 19. Here we find the description of the preparation of a fluid that is to help clear the ritual impurity out of a living body after it has come into contact with a corpse. For the preparation of this fluid a living creature – a faultless red heifer – must be killed. According to the description, the people who are involved in the preparation of the fluid will be ritually impure until the end of the day. The ritual impurity acquired after coming into contact with a corpse continues as long as the ritual of the Red Heifer remains unexecuted, but at least for seven days. 

scholarly journals Impossible Emotions: The Ethics of Mourning and Melancholia

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 74-93
Author(s):  
Tirna Chatterjee
Keyword(s):  
Sigmund Freud ◽  
Jacques Derrida ◽  
Life And Death ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
Impossible Task ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Mourning And Melancholia ◽  
Discursive Traditions

This paper looks at mourning and melancholia, and their ethical implications through the work of Sigmund Freud and mostly Jacques Derrida. The attempt here is to read through Derrida’s auto thanatological oeuvre through questions of fidelity, interminability, impossibility and ethics. In our perpetual struggle as scholars dealing with questions of meaning, existence, loss, life and death this paper tries to navigate the discursive traditions of looking at mourning and melancholia and what their radical potential is or can be where the mourning; melancholic; haunted; living subjects bear an impossible task unto the dead.

scholarly journals EL CH'ULEL EN LOS ALTOS DE CHIAPAS: ESTADO DE LA CUESTIÓN

2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (11) ◽  
pp. 218
Author(s):  
Elena Lunes Jiménez
Keyword(s):  
Social Control ◽  
Companion Animal ◽  
The State ◽  
High Plains ◽  
Review Of Literature ◽  
Day Of The Dead ◽  
The Dead

El artículo presenta una revisión de la literatura generada alrededor de la noción y concepto de ch’ulel, basada en la cosmovisión tsotsil-tseltal, en el altiplano chiapaneco. De acuerdo con las interpretaciones que los autores han realizado sobre dicho concepto, la información se sistematiza sobre los siguientes significados: ch’ulelcomo alma; en la salud y en la enfermedad; en la conciencia de los niños; como control social; el vayijelal o animal compañero como vela de la vida y como calor. Se distingue el concepto de ch’ulel con ch’ulelal;este último vinculado con la celebración del día de muertos. Se expone en su conjunto y como aporte de este artículo el concepto de Mundo ch’ulel.   SUMMARY The article presents a review of literature generated around the notion and concept of ch’ulel, based on the Tsotsil-Tseltal cosmovision, in the high plains region of the state of Chiapas. According to the interpretations formulated by the authors on said concept, information is systematized on the following meanings: the ch’ulel as soul; in health and in sickness; in the conscience of children; as social control; the vayijelal or companion animal; as candle of life and as heat. The ch’ulel concept is distinguished from that of ch’ulelal, the latter associated with the celebration of the day of the dead.  The concept of “ch’ulel world” is expounded as a whole and as contribution of this article.

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