Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

A meaningful discourse on death needs to take into account the various ways in which the body is “constructed” in different cultures. Biomedicine, which is rooted in western culture, places a great deal of importance on the body and this creates an anxiety over death. In contrast, the Indian science of medicine draws heavily from an ancient philosophical tradition in which metaphysical ideas about the soul have contributed to the relative insignificance of the body. Both disease and death have been understood in meta-body terms and there is a cultural embrace of death rather than its denial. The article concludes by suggesting the need to move away from sheer biological essentialism in understanding the human dimension of death in different cultures.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abhedananda . (19761). Life beyond death: A critical study of spiritualism(5th ed.). Calcutta: Ramkrishna Vedanta Math.

Albury

W. R.

(1993). Ideas of life and death. In Bynum

W. F.

& Porter

(Eds.), Companion encyclopedia of the history of medicine (Vol. I, pp. 249–280). London: Routledge.

Armstrong

(1983). Political anatomy of the body: Medical knowledge in Britain in the twentieth century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Arney

W. R.

, & Bergen

(1984). Medicine and the management of living. Taming the last great beast. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Bauman

(1992). Survival as a social construct. In Featherstone

(Ed.), Cultural theory and cultural change (pp. 1–36). London: Sage.

Bhāgvad Gītā. (1982). ( Swarupananda

Swami

, Trans.). Calcutta: Advaita Ashram.

Bynum

W. F.

, & Porter

(Eds.). (1993). Body systems. Companion encyclopedia of the history of medicine (Vol. I, pp. 81–205). London: Routledge.

Chattopadhyay

D. P.

(1979). Science and society in ancient India. Calcutta: Research India Publication.

Easwaran

(1996). The upanishads. New Delhi: Penguin.

10.

Filippi

G. G.

(1996). Mrityu. Concept of death in Indian traditions. ( Rigopoulos

, Trans.). New Delhi: D. K. Printworld.

11.

Foucault

(1975). The birth of the clinic: An archaeology of medical perception. New York: Vintage.

12.

Good

(1994). Medicine, rationality and experience: An anthropological perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

13.

Illich

(1975). Limits to medicine, medical nemesis: The expropriation of health. London: Penguin.

14.

Kakar

Ś.

(1982). Shamans, mystics and doctors. A psychological enquiry into India and its healing traditions. Delhi: Oxford University Press.

15.

Kamath

M. V.

(1993). Philosophy of life and death. Bombay: Jaico.

16.

Kleinman

(1995). Writing at the margin. Discourse between anthropology and medicine. Berkeley: University of California Press.

17.

Krishnamurthy

K. H.

(1998). Ayurveda (Part 3). New Delhi: BRPC

18.

Lupton

(1994). Medicine as culture. Illness, disease and the body in western societies. London: Sage.

19.

Mazumdar

R. C.

(1971). Cited in Bose

D. M.

(Ed.), A concise history of science in India. New Delhi.

20.

Mehta

(1972). The dialogue with death. Ahmedabad: Motilal Banarsidass.

21.

Parry

(1994). Death in banaras. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

22.

Sharma

(Ed. And Trans.). (1996). Caraka samhita. Critical notes. Varanasi: Chaukhama Orientalia.

23.

Stutley

, & Stutley

. (1977). A dictionary of Hinduism. Delhi: Allied.

24.

Turner

(1992). Regulating bodies: Essays in medical sociology. London: Routledge.

25.

Turner

(1996). The body and society. London: Sage.

26.

Weiss

(1983). Caraka Samhitā on the doctrine of karma. In Doniger O'Flaherty

(Ed.), karma and rebirth in classical Indian traditions (pp. 90–115). New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.

Death and the Discourse of the Body

Abstract

Get full access to this article

References