Description
Before completing this discussion question, watch
Death is Not Final: A Debate
(Links to an external site.)
(2014). Provide some examples of how early experiences with death can shape an individual?s later view of death. Provide real life examples. (attached)
Review the article Death American Style: A Cultural History of Dying in America
(Golbert, 2015)
and provide a short analysis/opinion of its content. Consider and discuss whether you think the U. S. is a death-denying or death-accepting culture. Discuss media influence and other factors that might support your perspective or that might have contributed to our views on death.
Library or Google Scholar, to critically examine the procedure that you have selected and its results. Offer a substantial response to at least two other posts written by members of the class. Be sure that you cite scientific evidence to support your views. A
minimum of 200 words
should be used for each response to other posts. Your response must be formatted according to APA style
Peer 1
In the video, Death is not final, we see an apparent contrast in how experiences with death can shape one?s beliefs about death. For example, Dr. Eban Alexander states that before his near-death experience he would have likely been on the other side of the stage with his opponents who were arguing that death is, in fact, final. However, he developed meningitis, which caused him to slip into a coma where his brain activity was severely low. The experiences he had while in a coma changed his outlook on life after death. In his perspective, there is no other explanation for such experiences. On the other hand, his opponents, who have given no indication that they have had a near-death experience, believe that there is a more scientific explanation for these episodes. Dr. Steven Nuvella, who argues that death is final, states that you cannot have mental activity without brain activity. Thus, these experiences could not have happened if there was no brain functioning.
This debate was quite intriguing to me and reminded me of a book I read years ago called Heaven is for real. In this book, a little boy named Colton claims that he actually went to Heaven. Now, of course, we cannot support or neglect his claims, however, some of his experiences contradict any scientific explanation. For example, he tells of seeing his father yelling at God. In reality, Colton was in the hospital operating room while his father was in another room praying. He was, in fact, lashing out at God for what was happening to his son. He also tells a story of meeting his sister, the baby that his mother had miscarried years prior. Colton had never been told that his mother lost a child, and it is worth noting that he was only three years old. Thus, it is implausible that he gained this information through any sort of documentation as he could not read. It is also worth noting that Colton never actually died or flatlined on the operating table. No one is sure how he had these experiences without actually dying, however, he was close to death. He had a ruptured appendix, and his body was filled with poison. (Burpo & Vincent, 2010)
As we can see, those who have experience with death or have been close to death themselves, have an outlook on death that almost mimics their experiences. For example, Dr. Nuvella sees death from a scientific standpoint as that is the only experience he has with death. While people like Colton or Dr. Eban Alexander will have a much different outlook on death due to their own near-death experiences. I, personally, am on the side that death is not final. I have heard many stories, like Colton?s, that cannot be explained by any scientific theory. Additionally, I have a strong religious belief that contradicts the notion that there is no life after death. Although I do not have any near-death experiences to report, my own experiences with death and how to cope with it have shaped my beliefs about death.
In the United States, I believe that we are a death-denying country. However, I also believe that we are slowly making our way into a country that is more death-accepting. For example, when we are faced with the loss of a loved one, it is hard to let go. It almost feels as though it is not real for a moment. We also fight really hard for those we love when they are battling illnesses such as cancer. We hold on to hope and the chance that circumstances could change. Even Doctors and Physicians have a difficult time accepting death. They are typically committed to preserving life and doing all that they can to help their patients avoid death (Golbert, 2015). However, we are more comfortable with TV shows and movies that are centered around death, and songs or artists that talk about death. It is becoming more of a norm to us now. The internet has also exposed us to more experiences with death than ever before. As Golbert (2015) stated, ?people are now able to go public with their impending death in a way they could not before.? Thus, we still do not have an accepting outlook on the topic of death, however, we are becoming more open to the conversation surrounding it.
Peer 2
Death, as defined in society, is dying, the end of life or the separation of the soul from the body. Regarding the video, both sides made compelling arguments regarding whether death is not final. Most people rely on scientific evidence to formulate their opinions, as with the example of the hammer. Others like Eben Alexander often change their mindset after near-death experiences. No side is either wrong or right regarding how they feel about death. The one thing they can all agree on is at some point in time, one dies, and the person will cease to exist physically.
Early experiences with death can shape how one views death later on in life. Johnson et al. (2017) refer to how most adolescents who have experienced such loss never spoke about their experiences and that many people are not prepared to talk about such tragedy. The essence relating to how one dies has a lot to do with how their loved ones cope emotionally. For example, my grandmother died of breast cancer at age seventy when I was fourteen. I watched her physically suffering when the medications had stopped working. I was sad when she passed, but it did not affect me emotionally as I knew she was suffering and wanted to be at peace.
On the other hand, my cousin, who was a few years younger than me, died at age sixteen, and emotionally, I never got over his death. He was sick for two days before he passed away. For year’s I lived with the fear of dying at a young age, and whenever I heard of someone who has passed very young, I often regress to the state of mind I was in when my cousin passed. According to Leming and Dickinson (2018), teaching children to be mindful of death at an early age helps with their confidence later on and their acceptance of it because it is a normal cycle of life. I was accepting my grandmother dying because she was at that age, but my cousin was an adolescent, and I was convinced that one should not die so young. Maybe if I had been given the proper resources on how to accept death, then I would have had a different view at the age when both deaths occurred.
Regarding the article, World War 1 and the 1918 influenza set the groundwork of how Americans view death. Gilbert (2015) refers to how death in the American culture is viewed as un-American as they are obsessed with beauty, youth, and achievements. Even with the current COVID-19 pandemic, America is still viewed as a nation that does not accept death. Some may argue that the nation has become numb because of the many strategies that have befallen the nation. In the media, death has become the main topic making it seem more tolerable than accepting. When a celebrity dies, there is a sudden reaction of shock and disbelief regarding the death. However, if a regular Joe dies, it is expected to accept the individual’s death and move on. The media and society, in general, dictate the mourning pattern and how one should feel about death. They are the predictors of how families within the American society should cope with death daily.
Fall 2015
151
Book Review
Death, American Style: A Cultural History of Dying in America
(Rowman & Littlefield, 2013)
Author: Lawrence R. Samuel
Reviewed by Charles P. Golbert, Esq.
Elder Law attorneys are often called upon to assist clients with the myriad issues arising from a loved one?s death. Helping clients deal with the stress, shock, and grief of a family
member?s death is an aspect of practice that law schools typically do not address.
Historical and cultural context can be helpful when Elder Law attorneys assist clients
as they cope with a loved one?s death. Death, American Style: A Cultural History of Dying in
America is an absorbing and exhaustively researched book by Lawrence R. Samuel that provides such context. Drawing from a broad range of sources, including literature, film, popular culture, journalism, policy initiatives, and medicine, the book explores how Americans?
attitudes toward death have evolved from the end of World War I to the present. Samuel?s
findings not only are inherently fascinating to anyone interested in American culture and in
Americans? attitudes about death and dying but also are of value to Elder Law attorneys who
guide older clients as they reflect on their lives and legacies, counsel families about end-oflife issues and hospice, and assist family members as they deal with the death of a loved one.
The 1920s and 1930s
Samuel observes that the 1920s and 1930s represent a turning point in the cultural
history of death in the United States, when the millions of people who died in World War I
and the 1918 flu epidemic caused Americans to think about death as they never had before.
Books about life after death became a literary genre. Interest in spirituality increased, along
with interest in s?ances. Dreams and hypnotism were believed to offer insights about death
and life after death.
During this period, to sustain a patient?s hope, doctors were disinclined to tell a patient
that he or she was dying. But doctors would often reveal the information to the patient?s
spouse, bestowing upon him or her an agonizing burden. Many patients who did know they
were dying kept it a secret. These practices made it difficult to achieve closure with family,
friends, and colleagues.
At the same time, as a result of the influences of science and modernity, death was soon
becoming, in Samuel?s word, ?unacceptable.? Scientists made great medical discoveries during this time, such as insulin and penicillin, and envisioned what would later be called cloning. Scientists wondered why humans die and whether dying was necessary. These questions
captured the popular imagination.
By the 1930s, professionals had taken over tasks surrounding death that, in the past,
had been handled by family. For example, most deaths now took place in hospitals rather
than at home. Undertakers assumed responsibility for the body instead of family members.
This disconnection with dying and death, Samuel argues, increased the difficulties Americans
Charles P. Golbert is the Deputy Cook County (Illinois) Public Guardian in charge of the Adult Guardianship
Division. He is also Past Editor in Chief of NAELA Journal and a member of the NAELA Journal Editorial Board.
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Volume 11, Number 2
faced when a loved one died. As death became unfamiliar, Americans began to see death as
unnatural.
The 1940s
In the 1940s, World War II impacted Americans? views about death. The War Department regularly issued widely publicized ?death lists.? Newspapers also reported on the heroic
deaths of soldiers.
Samuel contends that, perhaps because of its magnitude, death became euphemized.
Over the objections of some religious leaders, beautifying bodies for funerals became more
common. Undertakers were by now called morticians, no longer invoking the image of the
body being lowered into the ground. Graveyards became cemeteries. Coffins became caskets.
Caskets not only became more attractive but were being made of metals, as though, Samuel
suggests, to give the appearance that the body would not decay.
During this period, doctors began to realize that death does not always happen at a precise moment, such as when the heart and lungs stop. Instead, different body parts appeared
to die at different times. Boston medical examiner William Brickley reported his findings
regarding a man who was executed by electrocution. Half an hour after he was declared dead,
the man?s arm jerked when it was hit with a rubber hammer. Dr. Brickley also reported the
case of a woman whose heart started to beat again after being declared dead from a brain
tumor. Doctors and lawyers contemplated whether someone was dead or alive if there was no
brain activity but the heart continued to beat.
A movement to allow what was called ?mercy killing? took place in New York in 1947.
More than 1,000 doctors, members of the Committee of 1776 Physicians for Legalization
of Voluntary Euthanasia, signed a petition supporting the right of a person suffering from a
painful disease to end his or her life.
The 1950s and 1960s
In the 1950s and 1960s, science was dedicated to extending life even further. Millions
of dollars were allocated to research to eliminate diseases. Progress was made in organ transplants. The first heart transplant occurred in 1967, and liver and pancreas transplants were
becoming more common. By 1968, about 1,200 people around the world had received a
kidney transplant. Because some organs had to be harvested after brain death but while the
heart continued to beat, the progress in organ transplants invigorated the debate over the
definition of death. This debate was further complicated by the development of resuscitation
techniques. Doctors and policymakers also had to consider how to allocate scarce organs.
Longevity increased substantially due to advances in medical science. An American
baby born at the turn of the century had a 40 percent chance of reaching age 60. By the early
1950s, the figure had nearly doubled to 70 percent.
One doctor, writing in Better Homes and Gardens in 1958, contemplated whether medical science would someday allow people to live to 150 years of age and beyond. Cryobiology,
or cryonics ? which involves freezing the body and storing it until medical science discovers
a cure for the cause of death ? emerged as a field of study.
Due to increased longevity, the right to die and death with dignity movements gained
momentum. In 1957, The Atlantic published an essay by a widow about her husband?s pro-
Book Review
Fall 2015 Death, American Style: A Cultural History of Dying in America
153
longed and uncomfortable death in a hospital while medical staff attempted the latest interventions to keep him alive. In 1966, Simone de Beauvoir?s A Very Easy Death, a memoir of
her mother?s prolonged death from cancer, was published.
Samuel observes that a new, more realistic approach to thinking about death was also
reflected in the medical profession. In the 1960s, doctors started to break from standard practice by advising terminally ill patients that they were dying. A Harvard study concluded that
dying patients should be told the truth about their conditions despite the contrary prevailing
view within the profession.
The 1970s
Samuel writes that death, along with other taboos, came ?out of the closet? in
the 1970s. He observes that British historian Arnold Toynbee once described death as
un-American: a violation of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
In the 1970s, death was discussed and written about as never before. For example,
universities started offering courses on death and dying. Wayne State University, in Detroit,
opened the Center for Psychological Studies of Dying, Death, and Lethal Behavior.
Death was likewise depicted more frequently, and violently, in film and television. Critics contemplated why popular culture reflected this new interest in death. Some critics concluded that, in an increasingly individualistic society, confronting one?s own mortality took
on special significance. Some believed it was related to the new environmentalism, as well as
awareness of overpopulation, as people came to believe that society was destroying the planet.
Others cited the struggle to obtain closure on the Vietnam War.
The individualism of the period, combined with increased openness about death and
continued improvements in medical science, resulted in important developments regarding
death with dignity. In 1972, the U.S. Senate convened the Special Committee on Aging
to study the issue. In 1973, the American Medical Association (AMA) passed a death with
dignity resolution, allowing the terminally ill to be removed from life-sustaining treatment if
they signed a statement expressing such a desire. Large numbers of Americans started to sign
living wills.
A few years after the AMA passed its death with dignity resolution, Karen Ann Quinlan?s case was front-page news across the United States. In 1976, 1 year after the lower court
declined her parents? request that their daughter be removed from a respirator, California
became the first state to recognize living wills. Seven other states passed similar legislation
within a year.
The 1980s and Early 1990s
Samuel argues that, in the 1980s and early 1990s, many developments were driven
by the proactive attitude toward death adopted by aging baby boomers. One of several new
areas of death studies explored whether people could choose, consciously or unconsciously,
a particular time to die. In addition to anecdotal accounts of people who died shortly after
deciding that their time had come, the journal Omega published a study showing that people
are more likely to die shortly before or after a birthday.
Karen Ann Quinlan?s case played a large role in the 1981 Uniform Determination of
Death Act. Distinguishing between brain death and cardiovascular/respiratory death, the
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Act defined death as either irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions or
irreversible cessation of all brain function, including brain stem function. The Act was passed
in 39 states by 1987. By the early 1990s, Dr. Jack Kevorkian made assisted suicide a popular
subject in the media.
Samuel argues that Americans? phobia of death was reflected in health care spending
priorities. The two biggest killers, heart disease and cancer, received the largest share of federal funding while quality-of-life issues such as arthritis and mental health received relatively
little. In criticizing our emphasis on researching disease while paying inadequate attention to
quality of life, Samuel quotes George Will who, in commenting on the popular 1994 book
How We Die, wrote that ?[a]n obsession with longevity distracts us from our duty to live
well.?
The Late 1990s to the Present
In the final period of the 20th century, Samuel notes, death as a sacred event caught
on. Tuesdays with Morrie was a bestseller in 1997 and became the basis of a television movie.
The book records a former student?s weekly visits with a favorite college professor whom he
had not seen for some 20 years. The meetings took place over the last 3 months of the professor?s life as he died of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The professor?s graceful acceptance
of his death and his insights, including those on the primacy of love and relationships, was
inspirational for many readers.
In the 1990s, music therapy to comfort the dying became popular, and the notion of
the funeral as a celebration of life gained acceptance.
In the past, the death industry kept a low profile. But with so many baby boomers,
morticians began direct mail marketing campaigns. In 1999, HBO debuted Six Feet Under, a
comedy series about the industry. A popular and quirky book about the topic, Mary Roach?s
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers, followed 3 years later.
The events of 9/11, which Samuel describes as a collective near-death experience, made
Americans feel more vulnerable. He observes that the events remain difficult to comprehend
and continue to resonate.
The Internet also impacts death in the United States. Samuel notes that people are
now able to go public about their impending death in a way they could not before. Carnegie
Mellon Professor Randy Pausch?s ?Last Lecture? has received millions of hits on YouTube.
Websites such as GriefNet.org help people deal with the death of loved ones. Other sites allow family to broadcast funeral services, and to create personalized websites dedicated to a
deceased loved one.
Samuel argues that, although death is one of just two certainties in life ? the other
being taxes ? Americans are remarkably unprepared to deal with it. Despite some improvement in attitudes, death is still viewed as un-American in our culture, which is obsessed with
youth, beauty, and achievement. Samuel urges us to view death not as a stranger or adversary
but as a natural part of life.
One of Samuel?s recurrent themes is that doctors are often committed to preserving life
at any cost and view a patient?s death as a failure. He criticizes the medical profession for being inadequately trained in the area of death and in helping patients deal with death and grief.
The same can be said of the legal profession. Elder Law attorneys regularly counsel cli-
Book Review
Fall 2015 Death, American Style: A Cultural History of Dying in America
155
ents and their families about the disposition of their assets upon death, health care advance
directives, long-term care and hospice, and a host of other issues related to death. Yet law
school provides little or no training about death and how to help others deal with death and
grief. Death, American Style is not only a fascinating read but also a valuable resource for attorneys seeking the cultural and historical background necessary for a deeper and more nuanced
understanding of these issues.
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