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Book Cover
E-book
Author Tong, Chee Kiong

Title Chinese death rituals in Singapore / Tong Chee-Kiong
Published London ; New York : RoutledgeCurzon, 2004

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Description 1 online resource (viii, 194 pages) : illustrations
Series Anthropology of Asia series
Anthropology of Asia series.
Contents The problem of death -- The process of death : funeral rituals -- Temples and graveyards : ancestral rituals -- Kin and kindred : death and social relations -- Bones and souls : death and inheritance -- Flesh and blood : putrescence and the pollution of death -- Unnatural deaths -- Dangerous blood, refined souls
Summary "In recent years Singapore society has undergone a rapid process of modernization and industrialization, which has vastly changed the physical and cultural milieu of the Chinese, and yet the Chinese in Singapore are still ready to incur huge expenses in the enactment of death rituals. Viewing the rituals as heightened activities which conflate, refract and highlight the most important values of the Chinese, this book examines the changes and adaptations in Chinese death rituals and accounts for the continuing significance of death rituals in an increasingly industrialized, technologically orientated society." "Through a cultural analysis of the symbols of death - flesh, blood, bones, souls, time numbers, food and money - Chinese Death Rituals in Singapore throws light upon the Chinese perception of death and how they cope with its eventuality. In the seeming mass of religious rituals and beliefs, it suggests that there is an underlying logic to the rituals. This in turn leads Tong to examine the interrelationship between death and the socioeconomic value system of China as a whole." "Based upon primary research, this work is the first comprehensive study of Chinese death rituals in an urban setting. Its analysis of the development and adaptation of a traditional religious belief in a modernizing society will interest all students of Asian religions as well as Asian anthropologists and sociologists."--Jacket
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 178-187) and index
Notes Print version record
Subject Funeral rites and ceremonies -- Singapore
Death.
Chinese -- Singapore -- Rites and ceremonies
deaths.
SOCIAL SCIENCE -- Death & Dying.
Death
Funeral rites and ceremonies
Singapore
Form Electronic book
ISBN 0203493664
9780203493663
9786610050857
6610050856
9780700706037
0700706038
9781135798444
1135798443
9781135798390
1135798397
9781135798437
1135798435
9780415646604
041564660X