Death, Grief and Poverty in Britain, 1870–1914Cambridge University Press, 2005 M07 25 - 294 pages With high mortality rates, it has been assumed that the poor in Victorian and Edwardian Britain did not mourn their dead. Contesting this approach, Julie-Marie Strange studies the expression of grief among the working class, demonstrating that poverty increased - rather than deadened - it. She illustrates the mourning practices of the working classes through chapters addressing care of the corpse, the funeral, the cemetery, commemoration, and high infant mortality rates. The book draws on a broad range of sources to analyse the feelings and behaviours of the labouring poor, using not only personal testimony but also fiction, journalism, and official reports. It concludes that poor people did not only use spoken or written words to express their grief, but also complex symbols, actions and, significantly, silence. This book will be an invaluable contribution to an important and neglected area of social and cultural history. |
From inside the book
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Page 8
... spiritual test where suffering with fortitude was understood as a virtue (Christ's own suffering was held as the supreme example); alternatively, the drawn-out death provided time for the unbeliever to repent and turn to God. The ...
... spiritual test where suffering with fortitude was understood as a virtue (Christ's own suffering was held as the supreme example); alternatively, the drawn-out death provided time for the unbeliever to repent and turn to God. The ...
Page 9
... spiritual ideal . Rather , she urges us to appreciate the value of a ' good death ' ideal as a strategy for coping with terminal illness and the deaths of the young . 32 35 Jalland is committed to ' experiential history ' . She believes ...
... spiritual ideal . Rather , she urges us to appreciate the value of a ' good death ' ideal as a strategy for coping with terminal illness and the deaths of the young . 32 35 Jalland is committed to ' experiential history ' . She believes ...
Page 14
... spirituality. Crucially, death is inextricable from notions of loss and bereavement. The term 'loss' is used to refer to the removal or deprivation of something (or someone) that one had at a previous time. 'Grief' indicates the ...
... spirituality. Crucially, death is inextricable from notions of loss and bereavement. The term 'loss' is used to refer to the removal or deprivation of something (or someone) that one had at a previous time. 'Grief' indicates the ...
Page 15
... spiritual and intellectual ) are manifest in a cultural context . Similarly , Paul Rosenblatt urges that ' culture is such a crucial part of the context that it is often impossible to separate an individual's grief from culturally ...
... spiritual and intellectual ) are manifest in a cultural context . Similarly , Paul Rosenblatt urges that ' culture is such a crucial part of the context that it is often impossible to separate an individual's grief from culturally ...
Page 17
... spiritual world or a secular sphere rooted in memory. Funerary rites frame a response for negotiating the challenge death poses to the individual's self-consciousness; survi- ving bereavement transforms humans whilst re-energising ...
... spiritual world or a secular sphere rooted in memory. Funerary rites frame a response for negotiating the challenge death poses to the individual's self-consciousness; survi- ving bereavement transforms humans whilst re-energising ...
Contents
1 | |
2 Life sickness and death | 27 |
3 Caring for the corpse | 66 |
4 The funeral | 98 |
reassessing the pauper burial | 131 |
the cemetery as a landscape for grief | 163 |
7 Loss memory and the management of feeling | 194 |
8 Grieving for dead children | 230 |
death grief and the Great War | 263 |
Bibliography | 274 |
Index | 290 |
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Common terms and phrases
Anfield Cemetery argued Asylum babies BALS ABZ belief bereaved body BOHT Bolton Bolton Burial Board burial ground burial insurance burial service burial space cadaver Cambridge Catholic cemetery child Childhood classes coffin commemoration common grave concerning context corpse culture of death customs Cwmardy D. H. Lawrence dead deceased died dying Edwardian emotional emphasised exhumation expression father funeral Gissing grave deeds grave owners grave space grief guardians Haslingden headstone highlights History Ibid identity implied infant interment Jalland Jones Lancashire Lancet Liverpool Daily Post living London loss LVRO 352 HEA Manchester Maud Pember Reeves memory mortality mother mourning neighbours noted notions OH Transcript Oxford parents parish pauper burial pauper grave perceived perceptions post-mortem poverty private grave public grave Ragged Trousered Philanthropists Reeves relatives represented respectability rites rituals sense sick significance social spiritual stillbirth story suggests Tape University Press Victorian whilst widow woman women workhouse working-class culture