WEBVTT - Mourner for Hire 0:00:00.240 --> 0:00:02.520 From how Stuff Works dot com. This is the Stuff 0:00:02.560 --> 0:00:10.440 of Life. Welcome to the Stuff of Life. I'm your host, 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:13.119 Julie Douglas, and today we have a companion to the 0:00:13.200 --> 0:00:17.599 previous episode Life at the Death Cafe and our discussion 0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:20.480 about what makes a good death and what we can 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:23.840 learn from a study on end of life dreams and visions. 0:00:24.280 --> 0:00:27.200 And this companion episode will look at how as the 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:33.240 bereaved we find solace in ritual death can feel monumental, 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:36.520 and the ceremonies around it are an attempt to acknowledge 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:41.720 this immensity, particularly when the person is a beloved public figure. 0:00:44.600 --> 0:00:48.000 From his beloved second home at Warm Springs, Georgia, the 0:00:48.080 --> 0:00:51.360 body of Franklin Delano Roosevelt moves on the first stages 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:54.960 of a journey to his final resting place. Scores of 0:00:55.000 --> 0:00:58.800 sufferers from infantil paralysis sorrowfully bid farewell to their great 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:04.280 friend and the factor. Not all funeral rights need to 0:01:04.319 --> 0:01:07.959 be grand. There's comfort in small gestures, and some of 0:01:07.959 --> 0:01:12.600 these rituals seem kind of commonplace to us. One thing 0:01:12.640 --> 0:01:17.800 I really like about American mortuary rituals or practices is 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:21.720 this idea that somebody dies, people bring them food, it's 0:01:21.720 --> 0:01:23.840 a very American thing, and I think that sometimes it 0:01:23.880 --> 0:01:26.200 becomes this like really weird thing where people are like 0:01:26.240 --> 0:01:28.280 expanded with so much food that they don't know what 0:01:28.360 --> 0:01:30.640 to do with it. But it's the gesture of like 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:34.759 performing solidarity and support for somebody who is in distress. 0:01:36.120 --> 0:01:40.520 Other rituals to a Westerner may seem exotic. When we're 0:01:40.520 --> 0:01:44.280 looking at something like China or Taiwan, we have a 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:51.040 rise of professional mourners that are for higher often actors 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:55.960 or Chinese opera performers. That's Dr liv Nielsen Studs of 0:01:56.000 --> 0:02:01.120 Emory University, a bioarchaeologist and archaeologist special rising in funerary 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:04.720 practices and burials. We talked to her about the idea 0:02:04.760 --> 0:02:07.680 that rituals are critical in both their ability to allow 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:11.919 for the expression of chaos and death and to regain 0:02:12.040 --> 0:02:15.960 our footing and life. All along the seven mile route, 0:02:16.240 --> 0:02:24.079 people gather to honor President Roosevelt and his ideals. One 0:02:24.120 --> 0:02:27.640 hallmark of death rituals is the public display of brievement. 0:02:28.120 --> 0:02:31.560 And whether these displays or food offerings, crying or dancing, 0:02:31.880 --> 0:02:35.720 there's a performance aspect to them. Like the New Orleans 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:45.720 Jazz funeral, it's a great example of of marking this 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:51.480 time especial and kind of like creating uh a form 0:02:51.520 --> 0:02:59.720 of celebration around this transition. The jazz funeral is based 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:04.200 on the European fraternal society model, benevolent societies formed to 0:03:04.240 --> 0:03:07.680 take care of the sick and bury the dead. Members 0:03:07.720 --> 0:03:10.840 of these clubs parading down the street are participating in 0:03:10.880 --> 0:03:14.200 a rite of passage, lamenting mourners who walk with the 0:03:14.280 --> 0:03:18.040 casket accompanied by a sad tune, only to return from 0:03:18.040 --> 0:03:30.920 the cemetery dancing in a celebratory song. This may be 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:35.160 because in that first hurdle of overcoming death, the body 0:03:35.240 --> 0:03:42.200 has been dealt with, at least symbolically. Across from the 0:03:42.240 --> 0:03:45.680 White House in Lafayette Park, the men, women, and children 0:03:45.680 --> 0:03:50.360 whom Franklin Roosevelt served so well watch in tearful silence. 0:03:54.880 --> 0:03:57.840 After all, the body is the physical representation of the 0:03:57.920 --> 0:04:00.920 person to whom we still have ten drills of connection to, 0:04:01.560 --> 0:04:04.160 and the cadaver is a stark reminder of the loss 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:08.760 we feel. It's chemical breakdown signals an emotional breakdown that 0:04:08.800 --> 0:04:14.800 we're teetering on the precipice. There is an anthropologis Mary Douglas, 0:04:14.840 --> 0:04:17.240 who who talks about anything that is that when she 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:19.760 defines the dirt, it's matter out of place, things that 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:23.280 are not in their place. So, for example, a hair 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:26.000 on the head is perfectly fine, but a hair in 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:29.400 your soup, it's really disgusting because it's not in this 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:35.640 right place. Doctor cites French psychoanalysts. Surely a Kristava's concept 0:04:35.800 --> 0:04:39.880 of abject a thing or an idea that sits on 0:04:39.920 --> 0:04:42.800 the boundary of society as a threat to its structure. 0:04:43.320 --> 0:04:47.359 The cadaver, then is the ultimate abject. It's that matter 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:53.000 out of place. So we need to take care of 0:04:53.040 --> 0:04:56.479 this body in one way or another. And the very 0:04:56.600 --> 0:05:00.200 very great majority of mortar practices and different culture as 0:05:00.640 --> 0:05:04.080 there is a crucial component of the mortar ritual that 0:05:04.200 --> 0:05:09.120 has to do with handling the body. And it's this 0:05:09.320 --> 0:05:11.960 handling of the body that gives us the idea that 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:17.120 we can reclaim it from uncertainty and disorder. The way 0:05:17.120 --> 0:05:20.279 in which we then handle the body has to reston 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:23.960 it in some ways, with our ideas about what death is, 0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:28.720 what life is, how to treat a human body, and 0:05:28.760 --> 0:05:32.279 by doing that we don't only kind of transition this 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:38.320 individual into another existence, but we also make ourselves believe 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:47.080 that we can control uncontrollable death. To this end, we 0:05:47.200 --> 0:05:50.360 go to great pains to arrange the body. We like 0:05:50.520 --> 0:05:53.760 to see our loved ones. In our culture, we like 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:55.520 to see them the last time. We like to see 0:05:55.520 --> 0:06:00.560 them at peace, clothed in some kind of like sleeping arrangement. 0:06:00.560 --> 0:06:04.080 They're usually contained in a coffin. All these things that 0:06:04.160 --> 0:06:06.919 are may seem as really banal, are like perhaps the 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:09.240 most important to us. So the way that we produce 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:12.520 a good death says a lot about what we believe 0:06:12.600 --> 0:06:15.400 death should be right. It should be peaceful, should be 0:06:15.440 --> 0:06:19.920 without pain, it should be an eternal rest. It's often 0:06:20.279 --> 0:06:24.400 a more or less explicitly articulated idea that there's something 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:28.200 that comes after death. This preoccupation with order is perhaps 0:06:28.240 --> 0:06:31.440 the reason why funeral homes thrive in the United States. 0:06:31.880 --> 0:06:35.359 We want a sense of preservation, of stopping death in 0:06:35.400 --> 0:06:37.960 its tracks. The rights of the funeral home as a 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:40.320 kind of home away from home, where you're no longer 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:43.359 having people die at home and then the wake, but 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:48.720 rather a place of transition. If I compare to European 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:52.520 morture practices that are in some other ways similar to Americans, 0:06:52.880 --> 0:06:56.240 I think the embalming makes the funeral home necessary. I 0:06:56.240 --> 0:06:58.159 think that has something to do with the rise of 0:06:58.200 --> 0:07:01.240 this profession of like treating corpse is in in surgical 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:06.280 ways that requires a lot of professional know how that 0:07:07.520 --> 0:07:10.880 the rest of us can't do. And and that and 0:07:10.960 --> 0:07:12.960 that is a really I think it's a very very 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:17.360 interesting phenomenon because it's it seems for an outsider, so 0:07:17.680 --> 0:07:22.720 profoundly unnecessary. Now home again to the garden of his 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:26.800 family home in Hyde Park, New York, comes President Roosevelt. 0:07:27.480 --> 0:07:30.560 Here in the old and lovely Hudson River estate which 0:07:30.560 --> 0:07:32.880 several years ago he bequeathed to the people of the 0:07:33.000 --> 0:07:36.480 United States. The mortal remains of a man whose career 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:40.760 has known no parallel in our time will rest forever. 0:07:46.120 --> 0:07:49.960 The work that some of these professional undertakers are doing 0:07:50.080 --> 0:07:55.080 in communities and with bereaved people, and the way in 0:07:55.080 --> 0:08:01.800 which they are kind of like clergy um helping people 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:05.840 through this process. I must say that that is also 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:11.600 something that is profoundly important. I mean, we have no 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:18.480 problem hiring doctors or to to care for our our 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:21.600 loved ones. And I think that there is still some 0:08:21.760 --> 0:08:24.960 a lot of discomfort with undertakers in our society and 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:28.920 they do such an important work. So yes, it is 0:08:28.960 --> 0:08:31.880 definitely possible to do that critique of like how we 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:35.640 have distanced ourselves from from death, but when it's our 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.599 own parents that dies, I think that we that we 0:08:38.679 --> 0:08:41.560 still feel that in a way that's very intimate, and yes, 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:46.319 we hire services to help us through this, but ritual 0:08:47.000 --> 0:08:50.240 specialists have existed since at least the Bronze Age. So 0:08:50.559 --> 0:08:52.400 I have a lot of sympathy and love for what 0:08:52.440 --> 0:08:55.800 people need at this time, and I think that good 0:08:55.880 --> 0:09:00.840 undertakers do amazing work in helping people through something that 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:04.559 we need help through. So much of what we do 0:09:04.960 --> 0:09:08.199 is held up to ridicule, but it's just how you 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:14.040 blur your eyes, whether you want to see the silliness 0:09:14.080 --> 0:09:17.320 of what we humans do when someone dies, or if 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:21.360 you look at it carefully and seeing it something deeply 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:26.640 supply that's undertaker and poet Thomas Lynch from The Undertaking, 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:30.320 a documentary that dr shows her students to illustrate the 0:09:30.360 --> 0:09:34.439 importance of funeral directors in their role as guides through ritual. 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:38.760 These rituals help individuals in societies transition from one state 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:41.840 to another by putting a kind of fence post around 0:09:41.880 --> 0:09:45.440 the experience of death, and for a moment in time, 0:09:45.480 --> 0:09:50.120 we suspend normalcy, and during that period in time, things 0:09:52.080 --> 0:09:56.360 can be different, and often are explicitly different. If you 0:09:56.440 --> 0:09:59.720 doubt the power of ritual is a transformative thing, giving 0:09:59.800 --> 0:10:03.600 us permission to go a little crazy. Consider this example 0:10:03.960 --> 0:10:06.520 becoming a member of a fraternity on a campus or 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:10.679 a sorority. So when you rush, or when you manifest 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:14.640 your interest in becoming a member, you get selected, and 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:17.800 at that point you are no longer just any student, 0:10:18.320 --> 0:10:21.600 but you're not yet a brother or a sister of 0:10:21.640 --> 0:10:26.560 the fraternity. You are between and betwixt categories. And during 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:29.079 that period that you are kind of trying out and 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:34.640 like being initiated into, you're going to do stuff and 0:10:34.720 --> 0:10:39.400 experience things that are not really part of your daily 0:10:39.480 --> 0:10:43.200 life and often explicitly break the rules of society. So 0:10:43.280 --> 0:10:46.760 it could be things like, well, we know about all 0:10:46.760 --> 0:10:50.400 of these kinds of hasting rituals that include like alcohol 0:10:50.600 --> 0:10:55.040 or sex or violence, and a lot of traditional societies 0:10:55.080 --> 0:10:57.200 do this as well. You kind of go through this 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:02.160 period that often is where you're no longer not yet classified, 0:11:02.160 --> 0:11:04.440 you're kind of outside of social order. It makes you 0:11:04.520 --> 0:11:08.760 both very vulnerable, to being humiliated, to being tested. But 0:11:08.840 --> 0:11:11.440 it's also period during which you learn about what the 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:15.040 expectations are going to be, and it builds community among 0:11:15.040 --> 0:11:17.560 everybody else who goes through this bad time with you. 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:21.840 It's called communityAs so you build that in this anti structure, 0:11:21.840 --> 0:11:24.280 and then when you come back into society, when you 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:28.800 are kind of initiated into becoming uh brother of that 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:33.760 fraternity you aren't, you kind of shed that ambiguous status 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:40.640 and become a real member of that society. In the 0:11:40.720 --> 0:11:45.240 same way death, the ultimate initiation to life, allows us 0:11:45.280 --> 0:11:49.320 to upend expectations. We often see that, for example, a 0:11:49.440 --> 0:11:54.640 very hierarchical society can during this period of transition flip 0:11:54.679 --> 0:11:59.040 the hierarchy or allow things that wouldn't otherwise be allowed, 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:02.280 because when you do that, you can create a chaos, 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:07.440 or you can create a difference that marks this period 0:12:08.120 --> 0:12:11.679 as having a beginning and an end, and in an 0:12:11.800 --> 0:12:15.119 interesting way, that kind of like confines its un controls 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:19.280 it even with chaos. So you can have these piers 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:23.520 that are marked, for example by like carnivalesque behaviors, whether 0:12:23.559 --> 0:12:27.840 it's sex or alcohol or other vices, kind of like 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:30.840 playing that up and then bracketing it off as special 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:35.160 time allows the social structure to be reinforced. Actually, at 0:12:35.160 --> 0:12:39.880 the end of it, it's a push and pull between 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:43.480 anti structure, the chaos of death, and structure the desire 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:46.840 to control death, and different cultures deal with the back 0:12:46.840 --> 0:12:49.880 and forth in different ways. At an Irish wake, there 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:53.320 could be an outpouring of emotion, anger or confusion, joy, 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:56.440 and a good amount of alcohol to go along with it. 0:12:56.720 --> 0:13:00.640 But in China or Taiwan, family may outsource the expression 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:12.400 of grief to a professional mourner, often actors or Chinese 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:15.720 opera performers that are have realized that this is a 0:13:15.840 --> 0:13:22.000 much more lucrative and and easy way to support yourself, 0:13:22.280 --> 0:13:25.920 and when that kind of performer shows up, they can 0:13:25.960 --> 0:13:28.600 be they can show up to create that kind of 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:43.680 like huge moment of display of mourning and lass. And 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:47.080 if I understand it right, it's also intimately connected to 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:50.800 kind of like a piece the spirits, because usually during 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:53.760 these kinds of liminal times are also bracketed off in 0:13:53.800 --> 0:13:55.760 the sense that this is the time when the spirits 0:13:55.760 --> 0:14:01.320 are either susceptible for contact or sometimes they are kind 0:14:01.360 --> 0:14:04.480 of like more present. They're making their way into the afterlife, 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:07.920 so they're going to need all sorts of things um 0:14:08.000 --> 0:14:11.760 and so by showing giving a good show, you kind 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:17.119 of like show the afterlife administration that these people are important. 0:14:17.920 --> 0:14:21.440 And in a society where people are migrating a lot 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:25.160 and working a lot of really long hours and are 0:14:25.200 --> 0:14:29.160 not able sometimes to travel back to their village where 0:14:29.200 --> 0:14:32.120 they might have lost somebody, they can also actually supplement 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:35.680 their own presence by hiring somebody to be there in 0:14:35.720 --> 0:14:38.360 their stead. So it's it's both kind of like it's 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:42.760 an interesting combination of actually how this ritual has kind 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:45.840 of like molded itself onto new needs because of a 0:14:46.000 --> 0:14:50.280 changed sort of social economic reality. There are also professional 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:53.720 mourners for hire in Essex, England, who, for seventy dollars 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:57.240 an hour, can help bolster a thin turnout and converse 0:14:57.360 --> 0:15:01.240 knowledgeably about the dearly departed. Elsewhere in the world like 0:15:01.320 --> 0:15:05.040 western Kenya, populating your funeral with a stranger who will 0:15:05.040 --> 0:15:08.520 cry on demand, well, that's just tradition. And just like 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:11.800 traditions can morph to suit the changing needs of a society, 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:16.040 so too can the job of a professional mourner. You 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:23.320 also have these Taiwanese funeral strippers that start to manifest themselves, 0:15:23.360 --> 0:15:26.440 I think in the nineteen eighties. Uh and at the 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:29.840 time also when uh decency laws were kind of cracking 0:15:29.880 --> 0:15:35.120 down on nudity. Uh. This becomes like a new arena 0:15:35.560 --> 0:15:42.720 for strippers to come and distract and celebrate the spirits 0:15:43.080 --> 0:15:46.840 and bring a lot of people to the funeral because 0:15:46.960 --> 0:15:50.040 it's really again, it's really really important. You know, the 0:15:50.080 --> 0:15:53.920 more people show up to during this period of transition, 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:58.440 you send this message onto the next ext like to 0:15:58.480 --> 0:16:01.680 the next world, that this is somebody who's really important. 0:16:01.720 --> 0:16:04.760 And and this is also the moment when you kind 0:16:04.800 --> 0:16:07.360 of like transfer spirit money and all these kinds of 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:09.640 things that the that the that the soul of the 0:16:09.680 --> 0:16:13.160 dead will need to basically pay their way in the 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:16.320 next life. So the more people that show up and 0:16:16.360 --> 0:16:21.200 the more of a big deal it is, the more important, UM, 0:16:21.400 --> 0:16:23.880 this deceased is considered to be. So you kind of 0:16:23.880 --> 0:16:27.400 give them a boost into the into the next life. 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:31.000 And so if you bring in strippers, you will bring 0:16:31.040 --> 0:16:32.960 in a lot of people. But you're also going to 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:36.480 add to this kind of like sense of anti structure. 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:46.680 M Here we see flashes of skin gyrating bodies and 0:16:46.760 --> 0:16:50.480 we hear the thumping of music, all while revelers celebrate 0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:53.840 the transition of the body, the betwixt in the between 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:57.240 of the person who was their friend, their family member, 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:02.320 or their spouse. In this ritual, there's a nod to 0:17:02.360 --> 0:17:05.640 the madness of death, the sense of being hurled out 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:09.159 of time and place. It's the anti structure, the permission 0:17:09.160 --> 0:17:11.919 to explore the boundaries between life and death. Knowing that 0:17:12.000 --> 0:17:16.320 these times of exploration are limited, order will come rushing 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:27.399 back in. Matter will be put back into place. On 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:32.679 the afternoon of April twelve, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was signing 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:35.040 papers at his home in Warm Springs, Georgia, when he 0:17:35.119 --> 0:17:39.119 suddenly complained of a headache and slumped forward, losing consciousness. 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:43.200 The nation was stunned. For twelve years, f DR had 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:48.360 served as the Chief Executive. He was an emblem of stability, steadfastness, 0:17:48.760 --> 0:17:51.280 and the only way to bridge what felt like the 0:17:51.320 --> 0:17:55.760 treachery of death was through ritual. A good funeral is 0:17:55.800 --> 0:17:57.520 one that gets the dead where they need to go 0:17:58.240 --> 0:18:06.320 and the living where they need to be. FDR's body 0:18:06.400 --> 0:18:08.960 was carried back by train to Washington, d C. Where 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:11.840 full military honors were rendered in a procession to the 0:18:11.840 --> 0:18:15.639 White House, the public mourned, The casket was returned to 0:18:15.680 --> 0:18:18.159 the President's Hyde Park home, where it was buried in 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.920 the rose Garden. His family mourned, and in the end, 0:18:22.359 --> 0:18:25.040 the dead and the living all took the journey to 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:28.119 where they needed to go and where they needed to be. 0:18:49.520 --> 0:18:52.280 Thank you to Dr Live Nielsen Studs for guiding us 0:18:52.320 --> 0:18:55.760 through the fascinating world of funerary rituals. You can find 0:18:55.760 --> 0:18:59.639 out more about Dr Studs at Emory University. The Stuff 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:02.800 of Life is written and co produced by me Julie Douglas. 0:19:03.040 --> 0:19:06.720 Original music and sound design is by co producer Mill Brown. 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.840 Editorial oversight is provided by Head of production Jerry Rowland. 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.000 If you have thoughts on rituals, you can email us 0:19:14.119 --> 0:19:17.560 at The Stuff of Life, how stuff works dot com, 0:19:17.600 --> 0:19:19.760 and you can find us on Facebook and Twitter.