Homage to the Departed

Homage to the departed’ makes an original foray into the thinking of some tribal groups in northern Kerala about death and dying. Having realised that the available ethnographies of Kerala are often conceptually and methodogically flawed, Manjula Poyil has gone directly to her ‘‘source’’ and reports the beliefs and past practices of various tribal groups. Especially important among these is the aniconic tutelary deity, almost ubiquitous in historical India. The sensitive question of the space and voice conceded to women in social dealings with death has also been accomplished in the book.