Samenvatting

This article explores the relation between death, the fear and denial of it, and the appeal of mortuary rites attempting to transcend senses of mortality. It aims to show how our Own death, as a shamefull and solitary characteristic of modernity, has become a taboo and how it simultaneously continues to spur our imagination of the way Others die. Building on research in Suriname, it argues that both colonial compulsion and anthropological gazing have contributed to distorted and ambiguious attitudes toward death cross-culturally. As such, the article seeks to advance discussions on death and taboo as a perpetuum mobile of dread and everlasting enchantment.