DEATH SYSTEMS
"…THE
INTERPERSONAL, SOCIO-PHYSICAL AND SYMBOLIC NETWORK THROUGH WHICH AN
INDIVIDUAL’S RELATIONSHIP TO MORTALITY IS MEDIATED BY HIS OR HER
SOCIETY" Kavenaugh (1972)
We all belong to
and contribute to ‘systems’. The word ‘system’
is part of our daily lexicon. By virtue of our birth we are part of a
‘family system’. As citizens of a country we are members of
that country’s ‘political system’. We read of proposed
changes in our ‘health care system’ that may impact on us
immediately or in the future. So to with our legal and education
systems. How much we participate in and are influenced by each
system depends on our membership and level of involvement in the other
‘systems’ that modulate and regulate the society within
which we live. ‘Systems’ are a part of our daily lives. We
derive benefit from and contribute to the implementation, maintenance,
and expansion of our highway, electrical, sewage, gas, cable, and
telephone ‘systems’.
Robert
Kastenbaum (1998) has proposed a model of a systems approach to the study of
our community attitude towards death and how death as a ‘system’
influences us as individuals. He describes a death system as
"the interpersonal, sociophysical and symbolic network,
through which an individuals relationship to mortality is mediated by
his or her society."
Kastenbaum’s
system model consists of:
Five Components:
- People
- Places
- Times
- Objects
- Symbols
and performs Seven
Functions:
- Warnings
and Predictions
- Prevention
- Care of
the Dying
- Disposal
of the Dead
- Social Consolidation
- Making
Sense of Death
- Killing
Kastenbaum's model
does give us a way of understanding not only our society, but our role
within that society when faced with death in its many and varied
forms. An historical examination of death attitudes and practices is
plagued with difficulties that cannot be met using only historical,
social, or empirical methods. Kastenbaum's model may help us
understand not only our own death systems but those of historical
societies before us.
Some personal
thoughts:
1.0 Identify your
role in the 'death system' of the community to which you most strongly
identify.
2.0 What are the
'points of entry' into your personal death system?
3.0 What are some
of the short comings of Kastenbaums model? In other words, what has he
not accounted for?
Additional or
'Supplementary' Reading:
Kastenbaum,
Robert J., Death, Society and Human Experience 6th Ed.Allyn
& Bacon, New York. (1998)
