The Funeral of Mr. Wang : Life, Death, and Ghosts in Urbanizing China / Andrew B. Kipnis.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kipnis, Andrew B., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social sciences.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (190 p.)

Edition:

1 ed.

Place of Publication:

[s.l.] : University of California Press, 2021.

Summary:

A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. In rural China funerals are conducted locally, on village land by village elders. But in urban areas, people have neither land for burials nor elder relatives to conduct funerals. Chinese urbanization, which has increased drastically in recent decades, involves the creation of cemeteries, state-run funeral homes, and small private funerary businesses. The Funeral of Mr. Wang examines social change in urbanizing China through the lens of funerals, the funerary industry, and practices of memorialization. It analyzes changes in family life, patterns of urban sociality, transformations in economic relations, the politics of memorialization, and the echoes of these changes in beliefs about the dead and ghosts.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgments

1. The Funeral of Mr. Wang

2. Of Transitions and Transformations

3. Of Space and Place: Separation and Distinction in the Homes of the Dead

4. Of Strangers and Kin: Moral Family and Ghastly Strangers in Urban Sociality

5. Of Gifts and Commodities: Spending on the Dead While Providing for the Living

6. Of Rules and Regulations: Governing Mourning

7. Of Souls and Spirits: Secularization and its Limits

8. Of Dreams and Memories: A Ghost Story From a Land Where Haunting Is Banned

Epilogue

Notes

References

Index

Notes:

CC BY-NC-ND

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780520381995

0520381998

OCLC:

1236900649

Publisher Number:

https://doi.org/10.1525/luminos.105