Where do we go from here? Non-traditional funeral options in the US
Tibetan sky funerals (left) and Madagascar’s “Turning of the Bones” ceremonies are just two alternatives to Western burial practices. Image Source: Wikimedia Commons
As Doughty points out, in many cultures, funeral rituals around the death of a loved one are approached in a very calm, hands-on manner — one that would probably petrify many Americans who have, save for television crime dramas, never seen a dead body in the flesh. And if they have, it’s likely been a carefully preserved one that is made to look as though the person is “merely sleeping.”
One of the most remarkable practices in the world, which dates back thousands of years and is still overwhelmingly preferred by those within the culture, is the sky burial of Tibet. In these burials, the body is cut up into small pieces and placed at a site atop a mountain where it is exposed to the elements, including prey such as vultures, that allow the body to go back to the earth in its entirety.
In Madagascar, the burial of a loved one doesn’t spell out a definite, physical end to his or her relationship with living relatives: every five to seven years families exhume the bodies and attend to them — even dancing with them at times — in an event known as the “turning of the bones” ceremony.
While most Americans aren’t ready to adopt such drastically different funeral rituals as these, even here there are more alternatives to a casket burial than you might realize — and some of them are a little hard to believe.
European company Algordanza will turn your loved one’s ashes into a “memorial diamond” for a few thousand dollars. Since human bodies are chock full of carbon (20% before cremation, with 1-5% left over in the ashes), this isn’t as hard as it sounds. Upon cremation, the carbon is isolated from those ashes and turned into diamond growth factor that can be shaped into a gem and set in jewelry.
Environmentally-friendly alternatives, like green cemeteries where bodies are buried unembalmed and casket-free in biodegradable urns, are becoming more popular as people try to cut costs and be more environmentally conscious.
You can also choose to donate your body to science — usually medical schools — but this process needs to begin prior to your death. Wills usually leave a place for you to say which university or medical center you’d like your body to be donated to, and an agreement with the organization is made prior to your death. As long as you arrive in the promised condition, you’ll be put up in a cadaver lab for a year, teaching new medical students all about the human body.
Another alternative is the body farm, the most famous of which is in Tennessee. Body farms help forensic scientists study decomposition and lend themselves to crime research. At the University of Tennessee, several collections of skeletons, as well as bodies, are used for student, researcher and law enforcement agency trainings.
Other options, like the oft-mentioned “burial at sea,” are governed at the state, not federal, level. The Funeral Consumers Alliance has state by state regulations to help families make informed decisions about what to do with the body of a loved one, including options related to home burial.
As for the legality of Viking burials—one of the most well-known and fantastical customs, where dead bodies are placed on a boat and lit on fire? “Sorry guys,” Doughty says, “but Hollywood has lied to you.”
