Ahmed Zeineldin,
al-Mawt Bayn al-Mujtamaʿ wa-l-Thaqāfa [Death Between Society and Culture] (Doha/ Beirut: ACRPS, 2024), pp. 223.
Research on death emerged early in Europe, particularly within the framework of the history of mentalities. In contrast, Arabic scholarship on the subject remains limited. Among the most notable recent contributions is Death Between Society and Culture by Ahmed Zeineldin. The first section of the book explores people’s aversion to the subject of death, which is framed as a perplexing enigma. Zeineldin demonstrates that this reluctance reflects the early institutionalization of religion and the emergence of the rational man, marked by entrenched ceremonial practices, which shaped premodern rituals of social organization. The author emphasizes the importance of circumstances and modes of engagement with mourning and burial rituals, and contends that death can only be logically interpreted through the imagination – “the aptitude that produces religion and mythology”.
* This review was published in the 19th issue of AlMuntaqa, a peer-reviewed academic journal for the social sciences and humanities. You can read the full paper here.
