Days of Death, Days of Life

Kristin Norget explores the practice and meanings of death rituals in poor urban neighborhoods on the outskirts of the southern Mexican city of Oaxaca. Drawing on her extensive fieldwork in Oaxaca City, Norget provides vivid descriptions of the Day of the Dead and other popular religious practices. She analyzes how the rites and beliefs associated with death shape and reflect poor Oaxacans' values and social identity. Norget also considers the intimate relationship that is perceived to exist between the living and the dead in Oaxacan popular culture. She argues that popular death rituals, which lie largely outside the sanctioned practices of the Catholic Church, establish and reinforce an ethical view of the world in which the dead remain with the living and in which the poor (as opposed to the privileged classes) do right by one another and their dead. For poor Oaxacans, these rituals affirm a set of social beliefs and practices, based on fairness, egalitarianism, and inclusiveness.

ISBN 0231136897   Pages 336 ISBN13 9780231136891 (What's this?)   Volumes 1 Publisher Columbia University Press   Weight (grammes) 554 Imprint Columbia University Press   Published in New York Format Paperback   Height (mm) 206 Publication date 14 Nov 2005   Width (mm) 165 Library of Congress GT4995.A4   Spine width (mm) 20 DEWEY 394.266097274   Academic level Professional / Scholarly DEWEY edition DC22

		Introduction : death and life in Oaxaca		1
1		Anthropology in a Mexican city		25
2		Practicing popular religion in Oaxaca		70
3		Living with death		113
4		The drama of death		151
5		Days of the dead in Oaxaca		187
6		Spectacular death and cultural change		225
		Epilogue : life in death		265

[A] Masterful study... Highly recommended. Choice 12/1/2006 Norget's book should find a welcomed place on many of our shelves. -- Jeffrey H. Cohen Journal of Anthropological Research Vol. 63 2007 Will be useful to scholars... [while] still perfectly appropriate for the lay reader. -- Juanita Garciagodoy Journal of Religion Apr-Jun

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