Death_And_Its_Social_Implications

Death And Its Social Implications Death is the one social process that can be said is universal to all societies. However, what death actually means and the processes surrounding this transition are not so universal. Rituals are one way through which members process their grief and attempt to restore the social order back to their societies. The meaning of death: For the Merina, specific groups of people and specific areas of land are inextricably linked with fertility and the regeneration of life. For them, death is a time of mixed joy and sorrow: sorrow at the fact that they have lost a relative, but joy at the fact that the deceased will be regrouped with the ancestors. Therefore, the Merina funerary practices are centred around the theme of rejoining the ancestors and receiving blessing. The Lugbara see death as being the cause of an external and superhuman power – that of divinity. However, because women are associated with the power that comes from divinity, they are seen as the cause of death. Death disturbs the social order and their funerary rituals try to restore this order as fully as possible. There is also a distinction between physical and social deaths, which need not necessarily come together: e.g., in death, pollution, funerary, time, order, hence, fertility, deceased, women, social, rituals, lugbara, during, corpse, because, way, essential, cantonese, blessing, , very, transition, through, therefore, restore, polluting, physical, merina, linked, joy, highly, ceremony, bush-land, state, specific, source