Research Catalog

Title

The American way of death revisited / Jessica Mitford.

Author

Mitford, Jessica, 1917-1996.

Publication

New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 1998.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Description

xix, 296 p.; 25 cm.

Summary

Here is the classic anatomy of America's funeral practices, revised, expanded, and brought up-to-date for a new generation. This revised edition contains completely new chapters on, among other things, prepayment ("Pay Now - Die Poorer") and the new multinational corporations ("A Global Village of the Dead"), as well as a jaundiced look at the failure of the Federal Trade Commission to enforce the laws that the original edition of this book helped bring about. And, of course, there's a total updating of the facts and figures that tell the tale.

Subject

• Death
• Funeral Rites > history
• Funeral rites and ceremonies > Economic aspects > United States
• Mitford, Jessica, 1917-1996
• Mortuary Practice > history
• Undertakers and undertaking > United States

Bibliography (note)

• Includes index.

Processing Action (note)

• committed to retain

Contents

1. Not Selling -- 2. The American Way of Death -- 3. The Funeral Transaction -- 4. The Artifacts -- 5. The Story of Service -- 6. The Rationale -- 7. The Allied Industries -- 8. God's Little Million-Dollar Acre -- 9. Shroudland Revisited -- 10. Cremation -- 11. What the Public Wants -- 12. Fashions in Funerals -- 13. The Newest Profession -- 14. The Nosy Clergy -- 15. The Federal Trade Commission -- 16. A Global Village of the Dead -- 17. Funerals in England Then and Now -- 18. Press and Protest -- 19. Pay Now -- Die Poorer -- 20. New Hope for the Dead.

ISBN

0679450378

LCCN

^^^97049349^//r98

OCLC

37955796

Owning Institutions

Harvard Library