Death: Myth and Meaning (378-0-20)

Instructors

Grace Anne Christensen
Office Hours: W: 12pm-2pm (Winter 2027)

Meeting Info

Kresge Centennial Hall 2-410: Mon, Wed 3:30PM - 4:50PM

Overview of class

Death: Myth and Meaning - The Borderlands of Life and Death around the World:
This course explores global perspectives on the ways human beings have made and continue to make sense of death, dying, and the afterlife. Making sense of death often includes the presence of more-than-human entities who are involved in and around human life, death, and dying such as spirits, ghosts, the undead and the gods. Readings and discussions will consider the ramifications of death and dying not only in our (human) world, but how such phenomena ripple out into other worlds unfamiliar and strange to us such as the spirit world, the animal world, and worlds beyond our world. Death and dying creates a slippage between these worlds so that the borders between them are crossed and re-crossed by humans and non-humans until such borders become blurred and ineffectual. We will engage with this blurriness, considering borders both physical and spectral, through wide-ranging readings from the fields of religious studies, anthropology, history, critical theory, literature, poetry, and theology. We will also weigh the long-standing human preoccupation with "good death." By and large, human beings have viewed "good death" as deaths that occur in old age, that are not violent, that occur while an individual is in "good standing" in their particular religious tradition, and that do not create any unwanted spiritual or spectral residue in the form of unruly ghosts, spirits, monsters, or walking undead. However, because so very few deaths fit these criteria, the question must be raised - does "good death" as conceived of by humans even exist?

The course counts toward Religion, Health and Medicine (RHM) religious studies major concentration.

Learning Objectives

Students will know a variety of global perspectives on death, dying, and dead bodies and how those perspectives engage with more-than or other-than-human entities such as spirits of various types, ghosts, the walking undead, the gods, etc. Students will understand how peoples from around the world have made and continue to make sense of the phenomena of death, dying, and the afterlife as well as the perceived presence of the more-than/other-than-human in the world. Additionally, students will understand how people across the world wrestle with and articulate the idea of a "good death." Students will understand how the global perspectives discussed in class consider the ramifications of "good" and "bad" deaths upon our world and other worlds such as the spirit world and the animal world. By engaging with texts from a variety of scholarly disciplines, students will practice interdisciplinary scholarship and know how scholars from different disciplines engage with the topics of the course. Students will also know how to form rigorous and creative arguments and analyses. Lastly, students will know how to hold perspectives from people who are different from themselves, who exist across the world and across time.

Teaching Method

Class Materials (Required)

All the readings will be uploaded on Canvas.

Class Attributes

SoC Humanities and Fine Arts Distro
SoC Individual and Social Behavior Distro