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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 10 page paper discusses religious beliefs and cultural customs regarding death and dying among the African American population. First, it would be wrong to lump all African Americans together and assume they all share the same religious and cultural beliefs and use the same procedures when it comes to death and dying. That would be a gross stereotypical conclusion. There are a multitude of variables that influence any family's beliefs and customs. This essay reports the comments and discussions of a number of persons who belong to this racial community and/or who have studied the topics. There are some core beliefs that may be practiced by many of the black population, such as spirituality, the circle of life and the collective decision making process. These are explained and discussed. Bibliography lists 7 sources.
Page Count:
10 pages (~225 words per page)
File: MM12_PGblkd.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
For example, in the African American culture, levels of spirituality and religiosity play key roles in how one copes with problems throughout life (Thomas, 2001, p. 40). Passed On:
African American Mourning Stories by Karla F. C. Holloway is about African-American funeral practices (Ruark, 2003). It is a book that came about rather naturally for Holloway, who is the
Dean of Humanities and Social Sciences and n English professor at Duke University - there have been numerous funeral directors in her family (Ruark, 2003). Dying, death and funerals are
part of her family tradition (Ruark, 2003). Holloway said: "No culture bases so much of its identity on the persistent rehearsal of commemorative conduct as does African America. Some notion
of racial memory and racial realization is mediated through the veil of death" (Ruark, 2003, p. A23). When interviewing black morticians for the book, Holloway was told that black
people "like to put on a good show" (Ruark, 2003, p. A23). Comparing black funerals to white funerals, Holloway comments that black funerals tend to be longer with a great
deal more touching and kissing the body than observed in white funerals (Ruark, 2003). It is an expression of grief and anguish, traditions carried down through the generations (Ruark, 2003).
Dr. Ronald K. Barrett has spent many years studying how African Americans cope with death and dying and funerary customs and practices (Heller, 2001). Barrett emphasizes the fact that the
"black" experience of death and dying differs among different persons of African descent, for instance, Jamaicans have a different history and culture than African American and these are different than
the culture in Africa (Heller, 2001). Barrett also points to the dangers in attempting to identify the beliefs and practices of blacks because these differ based on any number of
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