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Is the Cemetery Dead?
In modern society, we have professionalized our care for the dying and deceased in hospitals and hospices, churches and funeral homes, cemeteries and mausoleums to aid dazed and disoriented mourners. But these formal institutions can be alienating and cold, leaving people craving a more humane mourning and burial process. The burial treatment itself has come to be seen as wasteful and harmful—marked by chemicals, plush caskets, and manicured greens. Today’s bereaved are therefore increasingly turning away from the old ways of death and searching for a more personalized, environmentally responsible, and ethical means of grief.
Is the Cemetery Dead? gets to the heart of the tragedy of death, chronicling how Americans are inventing new or adapting old traditions, burial places, and memorials. In illustrative prose, David Charles Sloane shows how people are taking control of their grief by bringing their relatives home to die, interring them in natural burial grounds, mourning them online, or memorializing them streetside with a shrine, ghost bike, or RIP mural. Today’s mourners are increasingly breaking free of conventions to better embrace the person they want to remember. As Sloane shows, these changes threaten the future of the cemetery, causing cemeteries to seek to become more responsive institutions.
A trained historian, Sloane is also descendent from multiple generations of cemetery managers and he grew up in Syracuse’s Oakwood Cemetery. Enriched by these experiences, as well as his personal struggles with overwhelming grief, Sloane presents a remarkable and accessible tour of our new American way of death.
Is the Cemetery Dead? gets to the heart of the tragedy of death, chronicling how Americans are inventing new or adapting old traditions, burial places, and memorials. In illustrative prose, David Charles Sloane shows how people are taking control of their grief by bringing their relatives home to die, interring them in natural burial grounds, mourning them online, or memorializing them streetside with a shrine, ghost bike, or RIP mural. Today’s mourners are increasingly breaking free of conventions to better embrace the person they want to remember. As Sloane shows, these changes threaten the future of the cemetery, causing cemeteries to seek to become more responsive institutions.
A trained historian, Sloane is also descendent from multiple generations of cemetery managers and he grew up in Syracuse’s Oakwood Cemetery. Enriched by these experiences, as well as his personal struggles with overwhelming grief, Sloane presents a remarkable and accessible tour of our new American way of death.
- GenresNonfictionDeathHistory
288 pages, Hardcover
Published April 25, 2018
About the author
David Charles Sloane
4 booksDavid Sloane is a professor in the Department of Urban Planning and Spatial Analysis within the Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California.
He researches and teaches about community health planning, food security, public safety, and commemoration from historical and contemporary perspectives.
He researches and teaches about community health planning, food security, public safety, and commemoration from historical and contemporary perspectives.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
April 22, 2019
I really liked Sloane's other cemetery book, The Last Great Necessity: Cemeteries in American History. Times have changed since that was written and cemeteries have started to struggle as they are replaced by street shrines, RIP murals, memorial tattoos, and other forms of remembrance while more and more people are cremated and their ashes either scattered or kept at home by survivors.
I wish Sloane had delved more deeply into the ethnic foundations of these "new" memorial formats. He mentions the institutional racism in cemeteries across the US (which existed into the 21st century in Texas, if not elsewhere), but he doesn't follow up by looking at the intentional destruction of historic African American, Asian American, Latinx, and Native American graveyards across the country. That history, combined with the distance to visit the cemeteries themselves, would seem to encourage people to record and mourn deaths closer to home.
I also wish he'd spent more time on Ching Ming, Dia de los Muertos, and other traditions that are only recently being welcomed into American cemeteries.
Instead, the book combines memoir -- Sloane's family has run several cemeteries across the generations and he lost his wife suddenly, which forced him into making arrangements for her -- with explorations into the ghost bike memorials, the internet cemeteries (though strangely, not Findagrave), and brief glimpses of new disposal methods like green burial and resomation. When I bought the book, I expected there would be much more of that.
It feels like Sloane is arguing that the cemetery is not yet dead, that it is in fact starting to feel much better. He lays out a number of ways in which cemeteries could change (and some are) in order to make themselves over for the current century. He argues that people can have it both ways -- a permanent grave and a streetside shrine -- without looking too deeply into why people might not want (or be able to afford) it both ways.
Over all, I found the book raised a lot of questions, but was repetitive in bringing up the same answers. It reads more like a collection of essays pulled together than a book thought through from beginning to end. Unlike The Last Great Necessity, which felt like it had visited many of the sites it discussed, Is the Cemetery Dead feels like it looked up from its desk to view its sites through a window. There's a distance from its subject matter that I wish had been crossed.
I wish Sloane had delved more deeply into the ethnic foundations of these "new" memorial formats. He mentions the institutional racism in cemeteries across the US (which existed into the 21st century in Texas, if not elsewhere), but he doesn't follow up by looking at the intentional destruction of historic African American, Asian American, Latinx, and Native American graveyards across the country. That history, combined with the distance to visit the cemeteries themselves, would seem to encourage people to record and mourn deaths closer to home.
I also wish he'd spent more time on Ching Ming, Dia de los Muertos, and other traditions that are only recently being welcomed into American cemeteries.
Instead, the book combines memoir -- Sloane's family has run several cemeteries across the generations and he lost his wife suddenly, which forced him into making arrangements for her -- with explorations into the ghost bike memorials, the internet cemeteries (though strangely, not Findagrave), and brief glimpses of new disposal methods like green burial and resomation. When I bought the book, I expected there would be much more of that.
It feels like Sloane is arguing that the cemetery is not yet dead, that it is in fact starting to feel much better. He lays out a number of ways in which cemeteries could change (and some are) in order to make themselves over for the current century. He argues that people can have it both ways -- a permanent grave and a streetside shrine -- without looking too deeply into why people might not want (or be able to afford) it both ways.
Over all, I found the book raised a lot of questions, but was repetitive in bringing up the same answers. It reads more like a collection of essays pulled together than a book thought through from beginning to end. Unlike The Last Great Necessity, which felt like it had visited many of the sites it discussed, Is the Cemetery Dead feels like it looked up from its desk to view its sites through a window. There's a distance from its subject matter that I wish had been crossed.
April 12, 2021
I love the history, serenity, and both the manmade and natural beauty to be found in old cemeteries. But are they becoming a thing of the past? Sloane gives readers a lot to think about in Is the Cemetery Dead?, from the modernization of burial (human composting?) to the changing trends in memorializing the dead. The prose can be a bit dry and, like many non-fictions that might be used for reference, somewhat redundant. Sloane would have benefited from more photos (and a few in color would have been nice), and more anecdotes to illustrate the broader points. There were several times I got lost in his descriptions. Eventually, I just put the book down to search findagrave.com and saw in a moment what was taking him so long to describe. Tables are fine, but imagine if Jesus had given us tables instead of parables! Stories are much more memorable than graphs.
Despite the flaws, Sloane's family background in cemetery management gives him an insider's credibility. He raises topics that had never occurred to me, shared ways in which cemetery owners are trying to stay relevant (some of which made me cringe, frankly), and makes me rethink my own final plans.
Despite the flaws, Sloane's family background in cemetery management gives him an insider's credibility. He raises topics that had never occurred to me, shared ways in which cemetery owners are trying to stay relevant (some of which made me cringe, frankly), and makes me rethink my own final plans.
January 3, 2022
We professionalized the caring of of the dying in hospitals and of the dying in funeral homes and cemeteries. We developed an aversion to discussing death.
Death always has been the reality that defines humanity; that has not mad it any easier to live with.
The real disruption is not that change is happening. Change is always happening. But this change challenges traditions deeply embedded in society and undermines the foundations of their associated institutions.
The facts of life and death remain the same. We live and die, we love and grieve, we bred and disappear. And between those existential gravities, we search for meaning, save our memories, leave a record for those who will remember us.
People cling to the iconic and graphic symbols that people have used for centuries, to represent love, loss, and sorrow.
We live in a time for dramatic change, yet we bring along elements of our traditions and rituals to comfort us.
Death always has been the reality that defines humanity; that has not mad it any easier to live with.
The real disruption is not that change is happening. Change is always happening. But this change challenges traditions deeply embedded in society and undermines the foundations of their associated institutions.
The facts of life and death remain the same. We live and die, we love and grieve, we bred and disappear. And between those existential gravities, we search for meaning, save our memories, leave a record for those who will remember us.
People cling to the iconic and graphic symbols that people have used for centuries, to represent love, loss, and sorrow.
We live in a time for dramatic change, yet we bring along elements of our traditions and rituals to comfort us.
November 26, 2023
A really cool overview of the death industry's view on memorialization and burial from the 1900s in contrast to the modern day. I learned a lot about different types of memorials (like car decals, roadside shrines, ghost bikes and the evolution of the gravestone) and how they interact with modern culture as well as their roots in the past.
I was delighted that it was written by someone from NY and told of a lot of cemeteries around the state. As well as the one he grew up on as the son of a third generation cemetery superintendent.
I originally bought this book to use as a source in a green burial movement thesis paper and learned so much more beyond that. The green burial movement and styles of internment are mentioned but not the main focus of the book.
I was delighted that it was written by someone from NY and told of a lot of cemeteries around the state. As well as the one he grew up on as the son of a third generation cemetery superintendent.
I originally bought this book to use as a source in a green burial movement thesis paper and learned so much more beyond that. The green burial movement and styles of internment are mentioned but not the main focus of the book.
June 28, 2018
It seemed like he repeated the same concepts often throughout the book. Cemeteries will always hold great historical perspective. Although there are more numerous ways to hold memories with the internet. I think we will all miss something if cemeteries completely disappear.
May 30, 2019
Really enjoyed this book. Written by a man who is descended from multiple generations of cemetery managers and grew up in a cemetery. He writes about how Americans are adapting or reinventing old traditions, burial places, and memorials.
August 4, 2018
Fascinating. First book in a while that I really *need* to discuss with someone. I probably will end up emailing the author.
September 28, 2019
Intriguing perspective of the future of cemetaries
June 28, 2018
393.0973 nonfiction2018 Interesting- readable-some pictures/photo. Selecting it off the new nonfiction shelf, related perhaps to the lose of a friend too far away to attend a funeral and comments from another mutual friend how unusual it had been.
I was curious about head stones in a family cemetery from the distant past. The more frequent laser etched stones and cremation urns and memorial benches are discussed. The major changes in funerals, celebrations of life, roadside shrines, the direct burial movement, and other rather major changes in how we view and morn death.
Well written, informative, sensitive .
I was curious about head stones in a family cemetery from the distant past. The more frequent laser etched stones and cremation urns and memorial benches are discussed. The major changes in funerals, celebrations of life, roadside shrines, the direct burial movement, and other rather major changes in how we view and morn death.
Well written, informative, sensitive .
September 3, 2018
Timely and thought-provoking work on the tensions in modern mourning between public/private, permanent/transient, traditional/electronic, etc. Highly recommended.
October 7, 2020
General overview of some new-ish Trends in Death (tm) in US culture in the past half century or so, though nothing that exhilirating
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March 15, 2019393.0973 S6343 2018
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews