Toothless Ancestors, Felicitous Descendants: The Rite of Secondary Burial in South Taiwan.

Abstract

This paper attempts to do two things: first, it describes the secondary burial as it is performed in south Taiwan; and second, it analyzes the symbolism of the rite. Although often mentioned by anthropologists in their writing on Chinese funerary and burial practices, secondary burial itself has seldom formed the focus of scholarly investigation. The narrative part of this paper thus fills a gap in the English ethnographic literature. The analytical part shows that the traditional understanding of secondary burial as a rite of purification is inadequate. It emphasizes ...

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