Research About The Inheritance And Change Of The Rural Funeral Culture In Western Zhejiang

Funeral culture is a system which consists of a whole set of mutually matched rites, customs and beliefs. It has great impacts on both society and individuals. In the process of historical transformation from traditional to modern, the society is undergoing a series of enormous changes. Adopting the qualitative research method, this paper based on the investigation of the funeral culture in Wucun villiage, Jiande city, shows the functions of traditional funeral culture in today’s rural society, such as death education, the transfer of filial piety culture, the fulfillment of people’s emotional needs and social interactions, the maintenance of life communities. It also reveals that the habitus and the valid functions of funeral culture are the reasons why it is inherited and still has strong vitality so far. Nevertheless, the rites in the funeral culture of Wucun village become simplified and commercialized because of the influence by modern modes of production and life, and also by the funeral reform. The connotation of funeral culture is losing gradually. Nowadays traditional life communities are weak and death is segregated from daily life, so how to face the issue of life-and-death and how to make the ancestors rest in peace as well as survivors recover are the main challenges when we rebuild today’s funeral culture and promote funeral reform.