Death and dying in a mass aging society
I. Dying in mainstream-Japan
A. Home altars and family graves
B. Ancestors and others
C. Family, neighbors and gifts
D. Cremation: law, purity and pollution
II. Dying in post-mainstream Japan
A. When?
B. Where?
C. The expanding service economy
III. “McFunerals” (SUZUKI Hikaru)
A. The contemporary funeral industry (inspired by wedding industry)
· Commercialization
· Rationalization
· Standardization
· Elaboration (selling pressure)
B. Moon Ray in 1990 and the new funeral process
- Encoffining (nyuukan 入棺) in the hospital’s room for the soul (reianshitsu 霊安室)
- Transportation of the deceased (shukkan 出棺) to home and funeral hall
- Consultation about arrangements (uchiawase 打ち合わせ)
- Bathing ceremony (nyuuyoku saabisu 入浴サービス) at home [POINT is that it de-emphasizes bathing as removing pollution and rather as refreshing and beautifying]
- The decorated funeral alter (saidan) [POINT is that it represents the other world → no longer an emphasis on procession and moving the person from one world to another but memorializing him/her there]
- The wake and vigil at funeral hall
- Funeral ceremony at funeral hall, including funeral speech (moshu aisatsu 喪主挨拶) and memorial address (chōji 弔辞)
- Cremation (dabi 荼毘) at the public crematorium, including picking up the bones (kotsu-age 骨上げ) in the ash-collecting room (shukotsushitsu 集骨室)
- 7th-day memorial service (shonanoka 初七日), at deceased’s home, now usually immediately after cremation
Suzuki’s question: How is the funeral industry transforming the meaning of death?
IV. New forms of death ceremonies: What is happening to conventional connections?
- Updating the standard funeral
· Redecorating the facilities
· Personalizing the funeral (e.g. use of female funeral representatives—better for gathering info and reassuring relatives; preparation of video)
· Embalming the corpse (after Great Hanshin Earthquake; more flexible scheduling; more beautification of corpse) - “Living” funerals (seizensō 生前葬)
- Post-death divorce (shigo rikon 死後離婚): Who sleeps (eternally) by whom?
- Eternal maintenance graves for the unattached (French 2002)
- The “funeral road” (野辺送りロード) of Gyokusen’in (Rowe 2000)
- The “cremated remains in a cubic parking lot” (ritai chushajo-shiki nōkotsudō リタイ駐車所式納骨堂) of Mane-ji in Tokyo
- Scattering of ashes (sankotsu 散骨) and the Association for Promoting a Free Death Ceremony
[If time] V. Making and breaking connections in contemporary Japan
A. The cultural meaningfulness of connections: Three propositions about Japanese norms of selfhood
- The Japanese self as a social being
- Personal growth as moving through a life cycle of connections
- Personal maturity as the growing capacity to manage relationships with responsibility and rapport
B. The social significance of connections: Finding a place in the institutions of mainstream Japanese society
C. The new actors as “disconnecting” from mainstream society