Death, burial and bereavement amongst Bengali Muslims in Tower Hamlets, East London

Abstract

This article discusses the circumstances surrounding death and bereavement amongst Bengali families in East London. Based on fieldwork amongst Bengali elders in the Spitalfields area the article suggests that death and some of the rituals surrounding it are rapidly moving from the private to the public domain within Britain. Whilst ‘traditionally’ in Sylhet most deaths involve the mobilisation of locally based social networks for support and ritual, material and social factors mean that in London death often takes place within hospitals and hospices rather than homes. Combined with this, rituals of bereavement are often carried out in Bangladesh, where bodies are returned for burial. This can mean that some members of the family, especially widows who do not usually accompany their husbands’ bodies to Sylhet, are excluded from important processes of ritual grieving. Many widows are also far more socially isolated in Britain than Stereotypic images of Bengali extended families might suggest. The situation is not, however, static. Within the context of rapid social and cultural change and the ‘Islamisation’ of some parts of London's East End, Muslim cemetaries are becoming established, and the ritual centre increasingly moving from Bangladesh to Britain.