Favole A., Ligi G. Anthropology and the Study of Death: Beliefs, Rituals, Places, Bodies, Politics

Abstract

The main subjects of Adriano Favole’s scientific research are political anthropology, museum anthropology, anthropology of the body and death, and cultural creativity. A. Favole is author of numerous articles and monographs. Gianluca Ligi has a degree in Literature from the Sapienza University of Rome in 1997 and a PhD in anthropology from the University of Turin in 2003. He is the President of the Methodological Council of the Master’s program in the specialty “Cultural Anthropology, Ethnology and Ethno-Linguistics” in Ca Foscari University (Venice), translator of the Sami communities’ field studies in Swedish Lapland, his research is focused on the Lapland history, anthropology of space, anthropology of landscape, risk perception, relationships between literary and ethno-graphic texts. This is an introductory article describing the basic theoretical aspects of the anthropological study of death. As the authors state, the anthropology of death is not so much a specific area of research as a thematic thread, the interest in which stems from its convergence with other disciplines and research perspectives. The introduction focuses on the connection between the anthropology of space and the anthropology of death; equally important is the connection between the anthropology of body and the growing field of research on the politics of death. Some text’s fragments of the used for this article translation are given according to the texts translated into Russian, and the rest citations are given in the translator’s translation.