HW 53

Cyber Space When Your Dead By Rob Walker

We've already found ways to make arrangements with our personal belongings for after we die, but what about the stuff we've left behind on the internet?  We are no longer keeping diaries or photo albums but instead we have blogger and flickr accounts. But how has this online life affected the way we mourn for those who have died? Mac Tonnies, a consistent blogger, recently died and left behind all of his online paraphernalia. He didn't have that many friends or a very actively engaged life outside the internet, but attracted many people similar to him through the internet and found ways to construct a meaning through there. They all mourned for him once he died, and may even have been more impacted by his death than the people he knew and met through regular every day life.


Dance, Laugh, Drink. Save the Date: It's a Ghanaian Funeral. By Sam Dolnick

In the United States, a traditional funeral often involves wearing black, listening to soft and sad music, having a priest, crying, so on. In Ghana, funerals have been known to celebrate the dead person's life rather than to mourn their death. Because of this idea, an average American might mistake a Ghanaian funeral for a wedding or another festive party. These funerals are a great way to meet other people, a great way to continue the social life. With the recent surge of Ghanaian immigrants in New York, these funerals have become more popularized- or at least noticed, by Americans- and we are surprised as to how they handle this death gathering. Ghanaian funerals are often very festive and sometimes competitive.

The two articles that I chose didn't have much in common with the exception of the overall theme of after death practices. One showed how using the internet to reveal a good portion of a person"s life  can allow the person to be mourned through the internet after death. It's almost like second life, except it involves a second cyber death.  The article on Ghanaian funerals showed how other traditions handle death as compared to our Western traditions. Unlike most Americans, Ghanians see death as a time to celebrate a person's life and much partying takes place.  I also watched a short clip called "Dancing with the Dead," previewing a ritual practiced in Madagascar. It shows how they unearth the dead every seven years to celebrate with them- reminding youth and elders of their ancestors and other important figures in their lives. It brings about a sense of happiness and before returning the skeletons to the earth, they rewrap them. I found this amazing because I reflected on how we renew our traditional funeral practices- by placing flowers at the grave site. It just seems kind of meaningless to me.

I decided to interview this director of the Walter B. Cooke funeral home, Mary Schmidt.
My step mom had already been in contact with her due to my little brothers death. When I called, she had little time on her hands and cut me off short. "When a person is cremated, how do we know it's their remains that come back to us?" I asked her. "We are a very professional funeral service. we only work with licenced crematoria. We are very careful to make sure that the ashes that return to us belong to the right person." I then asked her how people typically deal with the ashes from a cremation, and she responded by saying, "In most cases, the family places the ashes in an urn. In some cases, the ashes are placed in a pot either separately or with other family members. Some people chose to have the ashes buried with a tree or some other plant. The problem with this approach is that sometimes the land where the ashes is sold and the family will lose its connection to the plot." "how did you get into this business?" I asked. "This was originally a family business owned by the Cooke's. My father then purchased the business. He was the director of a small funeral business many years ago. We started the business in a small town in pennsylvania and moved to new york in the 1930's. We've been in this location ever since." The last question I asked her before we got off the phone was, "Do you find your work rewarding?" I heard a chuckle on the other end of the line, "I do! I enjoy helping families find closure after they've lost someone they loved."