would it be possible to get a hard copy of this paper?
Sian Hawthorne wrote:
> Gender and Religion Research Centre Seminar
> Department of the Study of Religions
> School of Oriental and African Studies
> Rm 336, 1:00-2:30 pm
>
> Friday 9th March 2001
>
> Orthodox Ancestral Practices of Maiden-Death in the Holo-Chinese Religious
> Culture of Taiwan
>
> Fang-Long SHIH, Department of the Study of Religions, SOAS
>
> This paper examines orthodox ancestral practices of maiden-death and
> their cultural implications among the Holo-Chinese speaking population of
> Taiwan. Maiden-death practices are very rarely discussed, either by
> Taiwanese people or by the scholars who study Chinese religious culture.
> Indeed, within Chinese religious culture, talking about death is problematic
> because it may invite ‘misfortune’, and, maiden-death is one of the most
> ‘polluting’ forms of death.
> Insertion into a lineage and ancestor-hood – as the means by which a
> person receives a family-name – has been understood as essential to the
> process of identity formation in Chinese culture. Deceased maidens are
> however, denied any place within a family’s ancestral lineage, and the lack
> of literature devoted to maiden-death practices would seem to reveal that
> maidens constitute a lack or absence of identity. In this paper, I will
> argue that maiden-death practices represent the other side of ancestral
> orthodoxy which constitute maidens as un or non- Chinese persons.
> _________________________________________________________________________
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Dina Dahbany-Miraglia Ph.D.
Department of Speech Communication & Theater Arts
Humanities 125
Queensborough Community College CUNY
Bayside NY 11364
718 631-6284/5
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