Death Rites and Rights

by Herring, Jonathan; Brooks-Gordon, Belinda; Johnson, Martin; Richards, Martin; Ebtehaj, Fatemeh

• ISBN13: 9781841137322
• ISBN10: 1841137324
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-11-12
• Publisher: Hart Publishing

Summary

Death has diverse religious, social, legal, and medical aspects and is one of the main areas in which medicine and the law intersect. In this volume, we ask: What is the meaning of death in contemporary Britain, and in other cultures, and how has it changed over time? The essays in this collection tackle the diverse ways in which death is now experienced in modern society, in the process answering a wide variety of questions: How is death defined by law? Do the dead have legal rights? What is one allowed to have and not have done to one's body after death? What are the rights of next of kin in this respect? What compensation exists for death and how is death valued? What is happening to the law on euthanasia and suicide? Is there a human right to die? What is the principle of sanctity of life? What of criminal offences against the dead? How are the traditions of death still played out in religion? How have customs and traditions of the disposal of bodies and funerals changed? What happens to donated bodies in the biomedical setting where anatomical education is permitted? What processes are employed by police when investigating suspicious deaths? What of representations of death? These and other questions are the subject of this challenging and diverse set of essays.

Author Biography

Jonathan Herring is a Professor in Law at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Exeter College.
Belinda Brooks-Gordon is a Reader in Psychology at Birkbeck College, University of London.
Fatemeh Ebtehaj is associate member of the Centre for Family Research, University of Cambridge.
Martin Johnson is Professor of Reproductive Sciences in the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Christ's College.
Martin Richards is Emeritus Professor of Family Research at the Centre for Family Research, University of Cambridge.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Death Writes	p. 1
When and How We Die	p. 11
The Meaning of Death	p. 13
Death, Euthanasia and the Medical Profession	p. 37
Criminalising Carers: Death Desires and Assisted Dying Outlaws	p. 57
Is There a Human Right to Die?	p. 75
Rituals and Practices of Death	p. 93
Religious Perspectives on the Afterlife: Origin, Development and Funeral Rituals in the Christian Tradition	p. 95
Purgatory: The Beginning and the End	p. 117
Rites, Rights, Writing: 'Tintern Abbey', Death and the Will	p. 133
Death, Ritual and Material Culture in South London	p. 147
Death on the Edge of the Lifeworld: The (Mis-)Appropriation of (Post-)Modern Death	p. 163
Dealing with Bodies	p. 181
'Hot' Homicides and the Role of Police-Suspect Interviews in the Investigation of Illegal Deaths	p. 183
Property, Harm and the Corpse	p. 199
Crimes Against the Dead	p. 219
Death and Tort	p. 241
An Anatomist's Perspective on the Human Tissue Act 2004	p. 261
Anatomical Bodies and Materials of Memory	p. 279
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