scholarly journals The Sealed Grave and Burial Rituals in the Context of Revenants in Ukrainian Belief

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-49
Author(s):  
Alina Oprelianska
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Folk Beliefs ◽  
Living Together ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Burial Rituals ◽  
Ethnographic Collections

Abstract The article* sets the goal of describing the Ukrainian ritual of the sealed grave and its relation to revenants, or the unquiet dead, based both on the author’s fieldwork and ethnographic collections of the turn of the 20th century. The meaning of the ritual and its variants are delineated through folk beliefs and institutionalised Orthodoxy and are defined as one of the main reasons for becoming revenants. Depending on a proper or failed funeral, the dead have different possibilities and time boundaries to visit the living. Together with biological reasons, the ritual of sealing a grave allows a seven-year period of return prior to the grave being finally sealed.

Burial rituals and cultural changes in the polish community – a qualitative study

2012 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 288-309 ◽  
Author(s):  
Igor Pietkiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Medical Personnel ◽  
Cultural Factors ◽  
Cultural Development ◽  
Community Members ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Written Narratives ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Folk Beliefs ◽  
Burial Rituals

Abstract The aim of this study was to explore cultural factors affecting burial rituals in Poland. Thirty-four university students collected data from their relatives and created written narratives about deaths in their families or community. Ten additional interviews were conducted with community members, a priest, and medical personnel as part of theoretical sampling and verification of emerging theories. The qualitative material was administered with NVivo and analysed using the Grounded Theory techniques to produce a complex description of folk beliefs, superstitions, as well as symbolic and psychological meaning ascribed to traditional customs. Some of the practices were found susceptible to extinction due to industrialisation, globalisation, and cultural development

scholarly journals Patterns of Memory in Askold Melnyczuk’s Novels as an Example of Ukrainian-American Émigré Fiction

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-137
Author(s):  
Marta Koval
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
European History ◽  
Family Stories ◽  
Traumatic Memories ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Definition Of

Although Ukrainian emigration to North America is not a new phenomenon, the dilemmas of memory and amnesia remain crucial in Ukrainian-American émigré fiction. The paper focuses on selected novels by Askold Melnyczuk (What is Told and Ambassador of the Dead) and analyzes how traumatic memories and family stories of the past shape the American lives of Ukrainian emigrants. The discussion of the selected Ukrainian-American émigré novels focuses on the dilemmas of remembering and forgetting in the construction of both Ukrainian and American narratives of the past. The voluntary amnesia of the Ame- rican-born Ukrainians in Melnyczuk’s novels confronts their parents’ dependence on the past and their inability to abandon it emotionally. Memories of ‘the old country’ make them, similarly to Ada Kruk, ambassadors of the dead. The expression becomes a metaphoric definition of those wrapped by their repressed, fragmentary and sometimes inaccessible memories. Crucial events of European history of the 20th century are inscribed and personalized in the older generation’s stories which their children are reluctant to hear. For them, their parents’ memories became a burden and a shame. Using the concept of transgenerational memory, the paper explores the challenges of postmemory, and eventually its failure. 

A Note on Tree Worship in the Zaza Folk Beliefs

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 404-407
Author(s):  
Victoria Arakelova
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Historical Evidence ◽  
Folk Beliefs ◽  
The Past ◽  
Turkish Government ◽  
Oak Trees ◽  
Individual Trees ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
Mountain Villages

The article presents some historical evidence about the veneration of individual trees, primarily the juniper and the oak-trees, traditionally considered to be sacred in the Zaza culture, as well as generally groves and forests. Unfortunately, the once vast and rich forestal covering of the Zazas’ main habitat in Dersim (Tunceli), which was a proverbial phenomenon still in the beginning of the 20th century, has been almost totally exterminated as a result of the mistreatment by the Turkish government. The folk beliefs related to tree worship have also been considerably erased from the people’s memory, lingering on only among the elderly in the remote mountain villages as a dwindling echo of the past.

Sowing the Dead

Massacres ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 135-154
Author(s):  
Tricia Redeker Hepner ◽  
Dawnie Wolfe Steadman ◽  
Julia R. Hanebrink
Keyword(s):  
Social Impacts ◽  
Number Of Factors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Community Healing ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Victims Of Violence ◽  
Burial Rituals

Chapter 9 discusses the social impacts of war in Uganda and, in particular, the interactions between the survivors and the victims of violence who are seeking proper burial. It shows how the bones of the Acholi massacre victims continue to assert their agency and hamper community healing. It also illustrates the persistent suffering experienced by those who survived the massacres and the dilemma they face in placating the unknown dead. The ability to solve this dilemma is complicated by a number of factors including the often-unknown identities of the deceased and the lack of resources required to perform the necessary burial rituals.

Butler English

1986 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Priya Hosali ◽  
Jean Aitchison
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Indian English ◽  
Folk Beliefs ◽  
Salient Features ◽  
19Th And 20Th Century ◽  
The Relationship

Butler English is the conventional name for a reduced and simplified variety of Indian English which has been characterized as a "minimal pidgin." This paper analyzes in detail the speech of 7 speakers (aged between 17 and 65) with a view to finding out, first, the salient features of this variety of English, second, the relationship between 19th and 20th century Butler English, and third, the source of the shared features. The texts revealed a dynamic mix of universal features of pidginization, folk beliefs about English, and incipient independent constructions. This mix indicates that Butler English is neither a "minimal pidgin" nor mere "broken language." It sheds interesting light on the origins of pidgins, but shows that attempts to "pidgin-hole" pidgin-like systems are doomed to failure.

scholarly journals Semantics of Traditional Funeral Rites of the Indigenous Population in the Northern Altai Foothill (Late 19th – First Half of 20th Century)

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 159-171
Author(s):  
V. V. Nikolaev
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Indigenous Peoples ◽  
Indigenous Population ◽  
Transition Period ◽  
The Body ◽  
Burial Site ◽  
Funeral Rites ◽  
Dead Person ◽  
Three Stages ◽  
The Dead

Purpose. The article reconstructs traditional funeral memorial rituals of the indigenous peoples inhabiting the Northern Altai foothills (the Kumandins, the Tubalars and the Chelkans) and its semantics. Results. The funeral memorial rituals included three stages: preparation of the deceased for the ritual, funeral and commemoration. The preparatory period for transition to another world included washing the body, dressing, preparing a new “house” for the deceased (coffin, deck, grave, frame, platform, etc.) and preparing the accompanying equipment (things and food needed on the way to another world). The burial day began with the preparation of the burial site at sunrise. In the middle of the day, the relatives carried the body of the deceased out of the house, mourned and made their way to the dead person’s new “house”. At the burial site, the participants of the procession said goodbye and buried the body. This day culminated in the commemoration of the deceased and purification of the participants of the ritual at sunset. The commemoration stage was accompanied with meetings, feeding and seeing off the soul of the dead person. Conclusions. Death determined the onset of the transition period for the deceased. A successful transition of the soul from one world to another had to be ensured by the correct performance of a complex of rites and rituals. At the same time, rituals were aimed at preserving the lives of living relatives and protecting the society. Elements of the rites had a symbolic character. Ritual practices were intended to ensure the cyclical nature of life. Influence of Russian and Orthodox traditions on indigenous Altai population led to transformations of the funeral and memorial rites and rituals. At the same time, the semantics of the rituals stayed the same and passed on from generation to generation.

scholarly journals Resurrection imageries: A study of the motives for extravagant burial rituals in ancient Egypt

2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jock M. Agai
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Ancient Egypt ◽  
Burial Practices ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
In Christ ◽  
The Dead ◽  
Food Offering ◽  
Burial Rituals

Unlike in the New Testament whereby faith in Christ can resurrect the dead, the ancient Egyptians believed that the bereaved created the resurrection of their deceased through burial rituals and by encouraging the living to serve their kings. They thought that faith alone in god or the gods was not enough to resurrect the dead, thus they seemingly superimposed resurrection alongside burials. Using the various forms of Egyptian burial rituals and evaluated from the perspective of the Christian concept of resurrection, this researcher attempts to search for the motives behind specific Egyptian burial rituals. The researcher proposes that the activities of the bereaved or of the living over the dead were paramount in resurrecting the dead in ancient Egypt. The purpose of this research is, firstly, to explain how the Egyptian burial rituals influenced their thoughts on resurrection and, secondly, to show that the Egyptian god(s) might have depended on the living to raise the dead.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The ancient Egyptians lived their lives mainly to satisfy the interests of the dead, hence their extensive burial rituals. Whilst they believed in the power of the gods to raise the dead, there seemed to be another motive behind their burial practices which suggested that the living may have had more power to raise the dead. The power was realised in the activities of the living in the form of burials, tomb designs, mummification, food offering, and in remembering the dead. This research explains that these burial activities were relevant in resurrecting the dead without which the gods alone were not able to do that.

scholarly journals Notes on some Argentinian corpses

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (13) ◽  
pp. 39-46
Author(s):  
Gonzalo Aguilar
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Military Dictatorship ◽  
The People ◽  
The Dead

Cinema takes part in the tradition of rites for evoking the dead that are also rites of separation from their corpses. Once the image is formed, the corpse can be buried. Sometimes this image is a tombstone, others a death mask or a photo. Cinema provided a new possibility: filming or recording the corpse whileit was alive. In this way, photography and cinema were the two most powerful instruments of immortalization (embalming) of the 20th century. This articleinvestigates immanent and transcendent corpses in Argentinian history: Evita Perón, the desaparecidos (“missing people”) of the last military dictatorship, andPedro Eugenio Aramburu (the de facto ex-President who overthrew Perón in 1955 and was murdered by Montoneros’ guerrilla organization), among others. Based on the cinematographic representations which evoke these corpses (with varying degrees of accuracy), as well as the popular expressions that accompanied them (militant songs, colloquial expressions, etc.), this text explores the transformation of a corpse, as such, to its consecration as the image of the people.

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