Through an ethnohistorical chronicling of the emotionally-laden treatment of selected suicide media-events, this book offers a neo-Durkheimean account of suicide, addressing its social-moral threat and the ensuing need to gloss over its unsettling incomprehensibility. An analysis of the social dramas, cultural performances, and suicide talk aired in the Israeli public sphere, it suggests that such public glossing practices atone for and bring about the symbolic rectification of the socially detrimental effects of suicide. Drawing on Durkheim’s thought on the social significance of suicide and the sacred cohesive power of society’s self-representations through rituals and commemorations, the authors revamp the contemporary pertinence of these cultural devices, showing how, in the process of reconstituting and redressing the disrupted order, suicide talk constitutes a revival mechanism of communal ‘life giving’. A rekindling of the Durkheimian approach to suicide that examines how society deals with suicide’s shattering of normative we-feelings, Suicide Social Dramas: Moral Breakdowns in the Israeli Public Sphere will appeal to scholars and students of sociology and anthropology with interests in social theory, Israel studies, suicide studies, and the interpretation of societal and cultural processes.

Although the 'Israeli case' of bioethics has been well documented, this book offers a novel understanding of Israeli bioethics that is a milestone in the comparative literature of bioethics. Bringing together a range of experts, the book's interdisciplinary structure employs a contemporary, sociopolitical-oriented approach to bioethics issues, with an emphasis on empirical analysis, that will appeal not only to scholars of bioethics, but also to students of law, medicine, humanities, and social sciences around the world. Its focus on the development of bioethics in Israel makes it especially relevant to scholars of Israeli society - both in and out of Israel - as well as medical practitioners and health policymakers in Israel.

Why people kill themselves remains an enduring and unanswered question. With a focus on Sri Lanka, a country that for several decades has reported ‘epidemic’ levels of suicidal behaviour, this book develops a unique perspective linking the causes and meanings of suicidal practices to social processes across moments, lifetimes and history. Extending anthropological approaches to practice, learning and agency, anthropologist Tom Widger draws from long-term fieldwork in a Sinhala Buddhist community to develop an ethnographic theory of suicide that foregrounds local knowledge and sets out a charter for prevention. The book highlights the motives of children and adults becoming suicidal and how certain gender, age, class relationships and violence are prone to give rise to suicidal responses. By linking these experiences to emotional states, it develops an ethnopsychiatric model of suicide rooted in social practice. Widger then goes on to examine how suicides are resolved at village and national levels, tracing the roots of interventions to the politics of colonial and post-colonial social welfare and health regimes. Exploring local accounts of suicide as both ‘evidence’ for the suicide epidemic and as an ‘ethos’ of suicidality shaping subjective worlds, Suicide in Sri Lanka shows how anthropological analysis can offer theoretical as well as policy insights. With the inclusion of straightforward summaries and implications for prevention at the end of each chapter, this book has relevance for specialists and non-specialists alike. It represents an important new contribution to South Asian Studies, Social Anthropology and Medical Anthropology, as well as to cross-cultural Suicidology.

Each suicide is as unique as the individuals involved, especially if one examines the nature of the act and to what extent these acts can be viewed as a theatrical performance. Focusing on the dramatic aspects of suicide may seem tangential to the physical and mental pain experienced by those who try to kill themselves, but dramatic aspects often provide important clues for understanding the mental state of suicidal individuals. David Lester and Steven Stack investigate what happens in the weeks, days and hours before a suicide when the suicidal individual must make decisions and formulate the script for his or her suicidal act. The editors argue that these choices may help us understand and prevent other suicides and stimulate new and innovative research in this important area. Through twenty-five substantive chapters, including both quantitative and qualitative analyses, this book offers insights into suicide as a dramatic act, with chapters on the intended audience, the suicide note, the location and method chosen, and cultural scripts, including suicide-by-cop, sati, seppuku, and duels. The contributors to this volume argue that psychological, social, and cultural factors influence these choices and that the decisions made by the individual are important for understanding the mental state of the person choosing to die by suicide.

Taking as its starting-point the 'death of tragedy' debate, and focusing on the supposed disappearance from the stage of the individual tragic hero, the book views selected plays and writings on the theatre by Miller, Williams, Maxwell Anderson and O'Neill as exemplifying four versions of heroism: idealism, martyrdom, self-reflection and survival. Julie Adam shows that these diverse playwrights share a desire to redefine tragic heroism in individualistic liberal terms.

Internet Dating deals primarily with the experiences of UK and Australian daters, examining their online accounts to see what kinds of narratives, norms, emotions and ‘chemistry’ shape their dating. Has the emergence and growth of internet dating changed the dating landscape for the better? Most commentators, popular and academic, ask whether online dating is more efficient for individuals than offline dating. We prefer a socio-political perspective. In particular, the book illustrates the extent to which internet dating can advance gender and sexual equality. Drawing on the voices of internet daters themselves, we show that internet dating reveals how social change often arises in the unassuming, everyday and familiar. We also pay attention to often ignored older daters and include consideration of daters in Africa, Scandinavia, South America, Asia and the Middle East. Throughout, we explore the pitfalls and pleasures of men and women daters navigating unconventional directions towards more equitable social relations.