Cremation in Romania: stereotypes and communist perceptions.

Rotar, Marius ; Teodorescu, Adriana

1. Introduction: The State of Cremation in Romania

In the current Western world, cremation represents a way of "disposing of the body" which coexists with burial, as an option which is gaining in popularity (1). It is regulated for every state and it is more frequent in Protestant countries than in Catholic ones. From a legal point of view, cremation in contemporary Romania is, like burial, an accepted funerary practice. However, from the point of view of the dominant Orthodox religion, we are dealing with non-recognition of cremation, as a Christian funerary practice, starting with the synods in 1928 and 1933, when religious services are denied to those who opt for cremation, cremation being, from an ethical point of view, very much similar to suicide (2). Unlike the Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church accepts cremation, regarding it as equal to burial, starting with 1963.

The fact that cremation is not accepted by the Orthodox Church today is the result of very complex historical circumstances, which have determined that, on the imaginary level, many Romanians perceive cremation as being assimilated by communism, as a reality and as an ideology. This fact can be clearly observed, not just in articles in the Romanian press after 1989 (3), but also in recent events in Cluj, at the beginning of 2012, when there where public protests instrumented both politically as well as by the Romanian Orthodox Church. The protests were organised against RDK Cremation, the company which was supposed to build a crematorium near the Manastur cemetery (4).

In Western space, cremation is currently defined as a funerary practice meant not just to answer spiritual needs specific to the era, modelled after values such as individualism, the freedom of choosing a post-mortem destiny, the special relationship with the body, the personalisation of funerary rituals, but also to solve difficult problems using different means, such as the lack of burial spaces and the unprecedented amount of mobility people have nowadays, people who, during their lifetime live in numerous cities and different countries but do not want to break ties with the remains of the beloved ones (5). In this context, discussing the status of cremation in Romania, revealing the nature of the resistance against the implementation of a cremationist funerary system--building crematoria, placing cremation in a ritualistic frame and the frame of public perception of normality--it becomes an absolutely necessary matter, and an urgent one.

For Romania, cremation is not a widespread practice, there is only one functional crematorium in where there were 853 cremation in 2010, which represents 0,33% of total deaths (6).

2. Aim and Methodology

The purpose of our research is to explain the social and historical mechanisms as well as the imaginary ones through which communist meanings are attributed to the practice of cremation. At the same time, we wish to analyse the way in which the transition is made between communist meanings and political meanings in general.

We will shortly discuss some historical facts which will point out the stereotypical quality of the tight association between communism and cremation and while also underlining, starting from an historical basis, the delicate position held by cremation within the current Romanian imaginary of death, with references to the more general problem of the insertion of cremation within the thanatic imaginary.

At this point it is necessary to mention that we do not claim and do not want to create an exhaustive endeavour. The reasons why cremation is rejected in Romania or at least frowned upon not only bind to the infiltration of communist meanings, mostly negative, within the semantics of cremation. To support this claim would be a waste from the point of view of cultural complexity of people in general, and the Romanian people in this case. Despite all of this, we consider the investigation of the exaggerate link which is created at the imaginary and current public discourse level between communism and cremation, and politics and cremation, is capable to offer certain explanations regarding the Romanian apprehension regarding the possibility of extending cremation, putting it on the same level as burial, from a feasibility point of view.

3. Cremation from the Perspective of Romanian History

We will approach the relationship between cremation and Romanian communism by following three steps. The first one would be taking into consideration some prime historic realities, which question the strong association between communism and cremation. These are, according to Marius Rotar's 2011 book (7), dedicated to the history of cremation in Romania, the existence of the Cenusa crematorium, since 1928 and the decrease in the number of cremations during the communist period, as opposed to the interwar period. So, it already seems obvious that the roots of Romanian cremation are not to be found in communism, but at least in the interwar period.

A second step is represented by a look inside the relationship between cremation and communism and establishing verifiable data regarding it. Through the law of nationalisation, the Cenusa crematorium becomes property of the state, Bucharest City Hall becomes its owner in 1948 which leads to the termination of the relationship between Romanian cremationists and the International Cremation Federation. Eternity through ashes (8) largely explains the mechanisms through which cremation starts to lose ground from the point of view of power and propaganda instead of being a cornerstone of the atheism spread by Communism, descendant of the Soviet model, as we could be tempted to imagine (9). The Soviet model of cremation supposed the premeditate use and the encouragement, by the communists, of cremation and the crematorium (the edification, in 1927, of a crematorium in Moscow, near a cemetery of non-functional monastery) as an instrument for fighting against religion and dissolving the tradition of burial, perceived as a cultural effect of believing in a spiritual transcendence. On the contrary, the Romanian cremationist movement emerged, in the late 19th, as an autonomous movement aiming at implementing the idea of a hygienic way of bodily disposal.

The correlation between communism and cremation is not an invention of the post-communist period in Romania. We can find it ever since the interwar period, in the dispute between supporters and detractors of cremation. For example the archimandrite Iuliu Scriban, one of the foremost adversaries of cremation, used this image in order to announce the bankruptcy of cremation in the USSR despite the intervention of the Soviet power in order to impose it (10). On the other hand, Romanian interwar Romanian cremationists expressed their admiration towards cremation in the Soviet space, without looking for complicated explanations for such a reality.

Cremation continues to exist in communism, but it is not associated with it, in the large and ideological sense of the term. As a result, during the first decade of communism in Romania, the number of cremation at the Cenusa crematorium was lower than during the interwar period. No crematoriums were built in Romania during the communist period.

Even though there is a corner dedicated to Communists in the Cenusa crematory, the Bela Brainer, corner, or the red corner--a corner where there are, however, Christian markings--, none of the high ranking members of the Communist Party have been cremated. As an example, Nicolae Ceausescu's parents were buried with an extremely sumptuous funeral service. Gheorghe Gheorgiu Dej or other prime-minister of communist Romania was not cremated. There are several explanations for this situation to be mentioned. Among these, two are very important: first, the rural roots of Communist leaders, and second the silent agreement between the Orthodox Church and the Communist Party, through a division of power, according to different fields of reality. The Church receives death and the Party receives life. As a matter a fact, this kind of agreement more or less visible did not passed unobserved by the historians. For example, Alain Besancon (11) showed that the Orthodox Church as well as the Catholic Church is guilty when it comes to communism. One is guilty of silence (12) while the other is guilty for having tried to establish communication pathways with communism. These explanations are able to destroy the idea of the undoubtedly persecution of Orthodox people by Communists or the classification of cremation and Communism in the same semantic field with the same values. Thus, Mihaela Grancea's statement, in the beginning of her book (13), according to which the Romanian communists leaders where atheists and only that secondary ones where buried needs to be regarded with much more than suspicion.

Of course we do not wish to support the fact the Romanian communists have used cremation as a practice meant to strengthen and demonstrate, in other people's eyes, the belief in communist ideas by defying tradition and religion. However these communists are less representative, from the second group. Cremation was generally preferred by the old communist guard--meaning the members of the party during the interwar period--, when it was outlawed.

A third step is represented by the investigation and the understanding of some historical facts with a high potential to create a negative image of cremation. We refer here to the events such as the Trandafirul (Rose) or Vama (Customs) operation. This operation consisted in the theft of 43 bodies of young revolutionaries from the morgue of the Timisoara County Hospital, two days after they had been killed, on December 17th, and their cremation at Cenusa Crematorium, under orders from Elena Ceausescu. This operation only became known in January of 1990, but it had a negative impact on the imaginary linked to cremation, it can be compared to a wiping of traces done by an abusive and radical political power. Events such as Trandafirul, when cremation, view as a radical practice to getting rid of corpses, functions like a political instrument, are part of a more extended, geographically and temporarily socio-political paradigm, called the Evil Politics of Cremation (14). Probably the best known form of the Evil Politics of Cremation is the cremation performed in the Nazi camps, during the World War Two.

4. The Components of the Romanian Imaginary of Death and their Interaction with Cremation

The imaginary cannot be taken away from the inner part of life, because such an action would result in a warping of human reality. Lucian Boia, one of the famous researchers on aspects and the philosophy of the imaginary remarks the simultaneous, social and imaginary character, of any human constructs of reality through the being tries to find a sense in the world: "man lives on two plains at the same time: reality and the imaginary, different plains, but between which there is a constant interaction" (15).

We will discuss three significant components of the Romanian imaginary of death. The purpose is to better understand their characteristics and how they shape the current perception of cremation. We will talk about political death, Orthodox death and death in the media, each with powerful semantic configurations, which gather around the idea of death, determining a certain attitude towards the reality of death, and generating a set of pre-established ethical judgments regarding them. These configurations began some time before the facts and are continuously motivated by it, but do not conform to it because they have their own autonomy. We must however mention the fact that, from the beginning, in reality, in the effective social-imaginary dynamic, these components rarely present themselves in the pure form we depict, they combine with each other, in different proportions, or with other elements of the imaginary and, if it is the case, the personal.

The first imaginary structure of death, the political death is made up of communist death --more specifically the common perception on communist death, to which the current political meanings are added, understood as a socio-cultural paradigm. In short, communist death can be viewed as, just like Lucian Boia (16) has shown, (pseudo)scientific, un-natural, anti-spiritual/atheist, a taboo. Communist death is an anti-natural death because it never arrives on time, melting in its imaginary substance the coercion and permanent threat of death and disappearance carried out by the secret police and their communist political prisons. A distinction must be made between what we have called political death and the way in which communism explains death. Because, on a prime level of discourse, communist philosophy defines death as something natural, belonging to nature, through its corporeality (according to the Marxist philosophic materialism) so that later it can be ideologically manipulated, meaning it will be inserted in the conceptual system of existence in and through the party (17). Death transforms, under the sign of politics and excessive disturbed history--just as Camus has mentioned in his works (18)--from an internal component of beings, inseparable from them, into an exterior form of repression and torture. The fundamental mutation in keeping with the same line of thought of Albert Camus, is from death to murder. Political death, as a structure of the Romanian imaginary, earns, from the negative perception on communism, dark nuances and contains suggestions of unnatural, anti-religious, nationalized violence.

These characteristics are deepened in a negative way, by the meanings of the political in Romanian mentality. Almost everything related to politics seems to be considered to have a negative relationship with society (19), just like during the communist period, even though it is not necessarily involving coercive power anymore (20). But the political tends to be, in nowadays Romania, associated with corruption and with an artificial intervention upon the normal course of reality, whether is about economic problems, whether about social or cultural ones (21). Thus, as we can observe in mass-media articles, many opposite constructions such as justice and politics, economy and politics, mass-media (22) and politics are formed, in the majority the political term being the negative one.

Cremation can only be placed in a negative way within such an imaginary context. This is due to the fact that it is trapped within a communist interpretation grid but also because of some problems of the imaginary related to cremation in general. Cremation is understood as an accelerated posthumous method of disappearing (through fire), meaning it is not natural and raises psychological obstacles from the point of view of the spatial-temporary imaginary of the body, of the way in which the living relate themselves to death (23).

The orthodox death is an important component of the Romanian imaginary of death. Just like Marius Rotar, has pointed out in his book, there is a tendency to determine Romanians to see the Orthodox religion as an important part of the national being. So, forcing a little bit the meaning of all this, when a Romanian dies, that person dies both as a Romanian and as an Orthodox. This inseparability is also noticeable during funeral services, which do not compete against civil funerals, such as the ones in other countries. This is a partial explanation why, despite a massive Westernisation, the Romanian people still hold on to their religious tradition. In such a situation, cremation must not only compete against a religion, but also with a system of national values. Orthodox death is a positive death within the imaginary of death, especially because it is associated (24) with a contemporary value--we would say a hedonistic one, nevertheless, this issue needs to be studied further--which is very functional in profane space: the appreciation for the human body (25). Despite all of this, Romanian cremationists have always fought in order to demonstrate that they are not anti-religious, they are anti-clerical (26). Orthodox death becomes problematic through cremation, not just because of tradition, the attachment of the Romanian people towards the Orthodox religion, but also because of its contents (27). Orthodox death is a refreshing death because it maintains the idea of a body which is not ravaged by death. It knows death, but not in a transitory sense because it will come out of it. We don't refer just to the doctrine of resurrecting the body, which, still valid in the Orthodox religion, could not be quite just as functional in an Orthodox imaginary of death, but it could be with the idea that Christ inhabits the body, in a demiurgic form within the human body as ontological support (28).

Death in the Media is a component of the Romanian imaginary, ambiguous, from an ethical point of view, of death, in a constant state of expansion. Excessive mediatisation of death involves the fortification of the same rituals and Orthodox norms and laying blame upon the ones which are different. In its own, it also values the body often (29). Basically, it can be said that the orthodox death, as well as death in the media trigger a continuous slide of cremation towards the negative pole belonging to political death. It must also be said that the negative political imaginary of cremation in Romania activates the negative part of the Western imaginary of cremation, such as the relation war-cremation, problematic freedom and the manipulation of ashes (30).

There are a few major errors which are being made in relation to cremation and its presumed communist nature. At their origin, they are logical mistakes. The fact that they are made continuously, their internalisation within the society determines the creation of cliches, and cliches lead to myths. A common mistake in approaching cremation as a communist practice is the transformation of the correlation into causality or into a bijective relationship. Communism is associated with atheism, but on the other hand, cremation is suspected to be an atheist practice, with a popularity owed to postmodernism (partially, this is an example of prejudice, it is enough to think that most of the persons cremated during the interwar period were Orthodox). Therefore, based on a common term, namely atheism, a false classification of cremation is made as belonging to communism, thus creating the idea that communism had generated/extended cremation. Other fundamental differences between communist ideology, fundamentally based on the idea of a community and the individualism specific to numerous cremationists are overlooked. The mechanism can be explained more easily the more the Orthodox Church stigmatises cremation, pointing out its unchristian aspects.

Another explanation for the correlation cremation-communism-atheism would be that in Romania a tradition of secular funerals is absent. This type of funeral, developed in other areas, in the second half of the nineteenth century, occurred for the first time in Romania during the communist period (often completed by cremating the deceased). However, in the climate of "explosion" of religiosity and orthodoxism after 1990 in Romania this correlation could easily be strengthened.

Another mistake is the exposure, largely in the media, to audiences which are not representative. Cremation is not what the press says it is, it is not the way in which it is illustrated by the press, as we will see when we will analyse the media discourse regarding this subject. All mass-media theories (31) have emphasised the fact that the reality captured by television--death included--, is superficial, constructed in a digestive way, and cannot be taken for granted.

One such example is an article published in 1994 in the Romania Libera newspaper by Razvan Bucuroiu, denouncing the fact that there was an Orthodox priest performing services at the Cenusa crematorium between 1928 and 1933 despite interdictions. Bucuroiu considers the crematorium to be a "pagan temple with an industrial touch", where "at the edge of the only room [...] the urns are full with communist activists and burned warriors, in a supreme eulogy for the victory of death and the barren world". He thought it was "the ultimate level of irony and shamelessness" the fact that there a Bela Brainer corner in the crematorium and even more than that he came to the conclusion that especially Jewish communists were burned there during the communist regime. In order to prove his point he would give quotes from the employees of the crematorium in that period, which would contain information about the presence of urns containing communists in the crematorium "Sir take these communists away from here! Next door at the mausoleum they have cleaned up. People get angry when they see them here. Look at them laying here like kings and they only have a plaque in the corner for the boys in Timisoara ..." (32)

5. The Way the Media is Contaminating the Imaginary of Cremation with the Political One

Like it is shown in the article, the Romanian media tends to strengthen the bond between cremation and politics and it even exploits it in order to receive a larger audience. The rhetoric of the press is anti-cremationist, acid and it goes beyond the illustrative function, citizen information. We will especially analyse here the reactions generated by the desire of RDK Cremation to build a crematorium in Cluj. There are some important aspects regarding cremation in Romania that are reflected in the mass-media. Briefly and summarising, we can observe cremation is (re)associated with politics through its content and function. The content refers to the stereotypes of cremation as a political practice, and the function refers to cremation as a feared instrument used by the current political forces. There is talk of the toxicity of ashes--sometimes naming the Nazi root of this image ("the Auschwitz effect"), the necessity to remove children from the vicinity of crematoriums (death is not the only object of this prohibition, since the cemetery is just as close to them). Moreover, the myth of the existence of a crematorium in Cluj during the communist era is mentioned again and the idea of building a crematorium is attributed to UDMR politicians (33).

The way in which the media tends to inseminate the Romanian imaginary of cremation with communist meanings, orienting Romanian expectations regarding the establishment of a crematorium by RDK Cremation in Cluj-Napoca is visible from the headlines they have chosen. Their neutrality is permanently undermined through a presentation that lacks values--from an ethical point of view, of the conformity with Romanian social and religious values--and the idea is introduced, not just through titles, but also through certain content elements, that cremation is a humiliating practice, which reduces a person to a cadaver instead of a dead body. Some of these titles are: "The Metropolitan Bishop: the Orthodox Church has never agreed with cremation" (34), "RDK Cremation wants to cremate 10-15 human bodies every day and 48 in extreme cases in their Manastur crematorium" (35), "The people of Cluj do not want a crematorium in Manastur!..." (36), "The Manastur crematorium, mercury poison for the people of Cluj" (37), "Crematorium for villains" (38), "Human crematorium makes believers go out on the street" (39), and examples can continue. It is obvious that, beyond the content, such article titles came out daily or frequently, as a reaction to the desire of RDK Cremation to establish the crematorium, people's perception about cremation could only be damaged. Especially if each newspaper page dealt with this subject also published pictures meant to shed a negative light on the subject. As it can be seen by accessing the links supplied on the reference page, barren images, from the point of view of symbol density and component images, pale from a chromatic point of view of references to reality, it is important to notice that they give the idea of an industrialised world, a machine world lacking rituals. But, and this is an important fact, this is not about a hyper-technological world, cremation is not presented as a representation of technological sophistication, it is rather represented as a factory, full of machines, which is reminiscent of the communist factories and plants. We can see furnaces in an empty room, or workers feeding the fire, or when Andrei Andreicufs intervention is presented, his fatherly figure. There is nothing wrong to show a furnace in a crematorium at first. Manipulation, the lack of honesty comes from a mass-media preferential treatment of burial, as compared to cremation. If the furnace is a part of the crematorium, if the fact that it functions is a clear reality which cannot be negated, it is also true that gravediggers, often dressed inappropriately and uncaring towards the pain of their clients, prepare the spot for the new body and reveal human remains. These are all realities of the practice of burial. However, the ways in which the two ways of disposing of the body are presented in the media are vastly different. It is enough to search through online or printed newspapers, in order to find images of more or less famous funerals, in order to observe that burial is illustrated as being a stable practice, from a ritualistic and spiritual point of view, and also a "beautiful" practice which brings piece. Thus, it is not normal that cremation presents itself in a reductionist manner, through the limitation to some components of cremation--such as the furnace, fire and, on the other hand in other circumstances, burial is still accredited culturally, through the way in which the press represents it using images.

The intervention of Metropolitan Andreicut named the example of the Soviet Union where the political regime imposed cremation in order to impact tradition and especially the Orthodox Church. This fact, from a Historical point of view, was a real one, but the economy of the intervention had a well defined purpose: introduce the link between communism-atheism and cremation in the minds of parishioners. If by looking at the history of cremation in Romania the example is out of place, because it had omissions regarding references to the situation of cremation in Romania and which would have demonstrated that there is no such link.

The press has continued to portray cremation in a negative light and connecting it to politics, after the protests (40) which took place especially in the Manastur (41) neighbourhood of Cluj-Napoca, caused by the involvement of the church (Andrei Andreicut, and the priests Dan Hognogi and Calin Popovici), politics (independent representative Mircia Giurgiu) and--it is arguable if it was in an autonomous manner--the civil society (represented by Emil Stetco, the leader of the foundation "Parinti clujeni"(Parents of Cluj)). Any possible analytical and critical valence regarding the discourse of the press has diminished ever since the protests are being announced and their two very disproportionate sides. RDK Cremation on one side and the people mentioned above on the other. There however a certain political presence between the two sides, namely the counsellors which have voted for the establishment of the crematorium and who are institutionally associated with the company which is building it. The opprobrium of priests and the civil society represented by Emil Stetco stand against this political structure, and also it is characterised by agglutination, an intensification of the political (42). The press, when it can, sends out darts against the idea of building a crematorium in Manastur, ranging from subtle references to accusations: "A suspicious business deal, which will bring 5 million Euros to the company every year. The Cluj town hall has associated itself with this small company, has offered the space for the construction for the meagre sum of 3 thousand Euros a year. The people of Cluj have contested the association between the municipality and the company, and are getting ready for a trial." (43) Thus, it can be observed how the political, in the most negative way, is associated with cremation. The same reporter who wrote the article mentioned above, also brings Emil Stetco's statement to the argument about how the crematorium would be guilty, in case it would be put into use, of an "Auschwitz effect". It is obvious how the political glides into its normal image, characterised by the perception of corruption, its far darker historical background and entering the imaginary space of Nazi totalitarianism. This must not make us believe that the association between communism and cremation was made and put in the spotlight. In a letter addressed to the Cluj town hall from the Adormirea Maicii Domnului parish of Manastur, Dan Hognogi, a priest, talks about the "two great atheist bloody analogies, which have marked the world in the 20th century, the Nazi regime and Communism, which have amplified the disdain for human beings because cremation was used on a large scale in order to erase the traces of great genocides" (44). The Orthodox priest is not the only one who talks about this relationship. Ionut Tene, a reporter, displays the link between cremation and communism (45) as a very old and stable one. There is a subtle analogy between the way in which people are treated in the communist regime--considered insignificant, tossed into crammed apartment buildings, and the way in which the body is treated after death, prepared for cremation, tossed into an oven. Thus cremation becomes not just a funerary practice which is typical for communism, but a way to express communist social and cultural aspects. "I have lived during the communist period when the crematorium was operational much to the despair of the people of Cluj. I was a child when I saw the atheist communists building a structure made out of fake red bricks in 1978 on the hill where the Manastur cemetery is located under the order of prime-secretary Mocuta, this red satrap who erected the apartment buildings in the neighbourhood so that as many workers as possible could be wedged in like sardines in the vast industrial bedroom. So it began: black smoke came out of the tower of the human crematorium, where atheistic communists burned their bodies". The reporter's condescension is ironic and edgy: "Of course there are people who want to be cremated like the communist atheists. They can be burned, but in a crematorium outside of the city". Moreover, it is not correct, because communists are not necessarily atheists, just like atheists do not necessarily have to be communists, and none of them develop a special bond to cremation per se. On the other hand, Ionut Tene committed a wilful error, because there was never a human crematorium in Cluj.

The failure to build a crematorium in Cluj (46) does not just represent the failure of a company to complete its business plans. It is not a bad thing that people have rejected the possibility of disposing of the body which would not take anything away from their freedom. But the way in which they did that was not right. There was an absence of real freedom, of making decisions, a true chance to inform oneself regarding the problem. A determining absence, in part due to manipulation strategies from the media, strategies which, on the level of the social imaginary, build up the unnaturally close relationship between cremation and politics.

6. De-politicization of the Imaginary of Death, the Chance of a Free Cremationist Imaginary

The excessive use of cliches regarding cremation leads to the creation of myths. Making cremation political on the level of the Romanian imaginary is based on the identification of cremation as a funerary practice which is typical for communism. Attributing communist meanings to cremation is, however, just one of the Romanian anti-cremationist forms. The myth of cremation as a political form damages the imaginary of cremation. This happens because, as it has been proven, political myths can be characterised by a rarefaction of images and an amplification of the ideological discourse. It will be increasingly difficult for cremation to find ways towards a symbolic reconversion necessary for a free human imaginary. Cremation, just like any fact belonging to reality must be approached with a critical spirit, in order not to facilitate possible manipulation mechanisms.

Acknowledgements:

This work was supported by the Romanian National Council for Scientific Reaserch CNCS-UEFISCDI, grant number 54/2011-PNII TE.

References:

(1) C.D. Bryant D.L. Peck (eds.), Encyclopedia of Death and Human Experience, Sage Publishing, London, 2009, pp. 235-240.

(2) Necula N.D., Traditie si innoire in slujirea liturgica (Tradition and Renewal in Liturgical Service), Ed. Episcopiei Dunarii de Jos Galati, 1996.

(3) Daniel Caltan: Comunistii dati afara de la Crematoriul Cenusa (Communists Kicked out of the Cenusa Crematorium), in Evenimentul Zilei, 1486, VI, 1997, p.3. Cosmin Torr, Dan Bacan: Ne-am plimbat pe culoarele mortii. Libertatea a vazut miile de urne din Crematoriul Cenusa (We Have Walked through the Halls of Death. Libertatea has seen thousands of urns in the Cenusa crematorium), in Libertatea, 5987, 2006, p.6. Paula Enescu: Locul unde oamenii devin cenusa (The Place Where People Become Ashes), in Adevarul, 4607, 2005, p.8. For the main ideas contained in these articles, please consult: Marius Rotar, Eternitate prin cenusa. O istorie a crematoriilor si incinerarilor umane in Romania secolelor XIX-XXI (Eternity through Ashes. A History of Crematoria and Human Cremation in XIX-XX Century Romania), European Institute, Iasi, 2011, pp. 525-556.

(4) Florina Pop: Primul crematoriu uman din Transilvania se va amenaja in Cluj (The First Human Crematorium in Transylvania Will be Established in Cluj), http://www.adevarul.ro/locale/clujnapoca/Primul_crematoriu_uman_din_Transilvania_se_va_amenaja_in_Cluj_0_575342 463.html. For a view on current events regarding the crematorium in Cluj-Napoca and the main reactions in the press, consult the blog of the Romanian Cremationist Society Amurg http://www.incinerareamurg.ro/noutati-news-2.

(5) D. J. Douglas, Encyclopaedia of Cremation, Ashgate Publishing Company, 2005. H. Grainger, Death Redesigned. British Crematoria: History, Architecture and Landscape, Spire Books Ltd., Reading, 2005.

(6) International Cremation Statistics, in Pharos International, 37, 4, 2011, p.33.

(7) Marius Rotar, Op.cit, pp. 359-489.

(8) Ibidem.

(9) Ever since the Romanian interwar period, cremation has been viewed and criticised as not being typically Romanian, much like the affiliation of this practice with atheism and freemasonry. Among the people who have manifested a strong opposition towards cremation was archimandrite Iuliu Scriban. In the magazine of the Romanian Orthodox Church in 1923, the former name of the Cenusa cremationist society, namely Nirvana, can be found, a food reason to argument that cremation is a foreign, borrowed practice which damages the Christian Romanian spirit, which hides under the theoretical necessity for progress. Cf.: Iuliu Scriban: Ce ne mailipsea... Arderea mortilor. insemnari marunte (What We Were Missing... Burning the Dead. Short Notes), in Biserica Ortodoxa Romana, XLI, 5, March 1923, p. 389.

(10) Iuliu Scriban: Poticnirea Cenusariei, in Glasul Monahilor, VII, 195, 1929, pp.1-2.

(11) Alain Besancon: How to Recognise Communism as a Structure of Sin, in Essays About the Current World, translation from French by Adina Cobuz, Humanitas, Bucharest, 2007, pp. 139-158.

(12) About the Silence of the Orthodox Church during the Communist period, and about its recognition by the Church, immediately during the Revolution, see Iuliana Conovici, Ortodoxia in Romania postcomunista. Reconstructia unei identitati publice (The Orthodox Religion in Romania after Communism. Reconstruction of a Public Identity), volume I, Eikon, Cluj-Napoca, 2009, pp. 71-77.

(13) Mihaela Grancea, Reprezentari ale mortii in Romania epocii comuniste. Trei studii de antropologe culturala (Representations of Death in Communist Romania. Three Cultural Anthropological Studies), Carti de Stiinta, Cluj-Napoca, 2007, p. 12.

(14) Marius Rotar: The Mask of The Red Death: the Evil Politics of Cremation in Romania in December 1989, in Mortality, 15, 1, 2010, pp. 1-17.

(15) Lucian Boia, Tinerete fara batranete. Imaginarul longevitatii din Antichitate pana astazi (Youth Without Old Age. The Imaginary of Longevity from Ancient Times until Today), translation by Valentina Nicolae, Humanitas, Bucharest, 2006, p. 7.

(16) Lucian Boia, Mitologia stiintifica a comunismului (The Scientific Mythology of Communism), Bucuresti, Humanitas, 2005.

(17) Mihaela Grancea, Op. cit.

(18) Arthur Koestler, Albert Camus, Renectii asupra pedepsei cu moartea (Reflections on the Death Sentence), translation from French by Ioana Ilie, Humanitas, Bucharest, 2008 [Reflexions sur la guillotine, 1957]. Albert Camus, Omul revoltat, in Fata si reversul, Nunta, Mitul lui Sisif, Omul revoltat, Vara, translation from French by Irina Mavrodin, Mihaela Simion, Modest Morariu. Rao, Bucharest, 2001 [Lhomme revolte, Gallimard, Paris, 1951].

(19) Emanuel Copilas: Confiscarea lui Dumnezeu si mecanismul inevitabilitatii istorice. O comparare intre mitologia legionara si cea a comunismului romanesc (Confiscation of God and the Mechanism of Historical Inevitability. A Comparison Between Legionary Mythology and Romanian Communist Mythology) (II), in the Sfera Politicii, nr. 139, 2009, pp. 82-94.

(20) Vasile Sebastian Dancu, Jara telespectatorilor fericiti (The Land of Happy Television Viewers, Counter- ideologies), Dacia, Cluj-Napoca, 2000.

(21) Cf.: Dragos Cabat: Victimele politicului (Victims of Politics), http://www.efin.ro/victimele_politicului_ht.html. Nicoleta Sima: Neincrederea in politicienii romani (Distrust in Romanian Politicians), http://www.ziardambovita.ro/index.php?categoryid=11&p2_articleid=10285&p45_monthid=8&p45_dayid=16&p45_yearid =2007. Alexandru Matei: Oamenii de afaceri: solutia unui premier tehnocrat este cea mai buna in condyle actuale de criza (Businessmen: The Solution of a Technocratic Prime Minister is the Best One during the Crysis), http://www.zf.ro/eveniment/oamenii-de-afaceri-solutia-unui-premier-tehnocrat-este-cea-mai-buna-in-conditiile-actuale- de-criza-9210356. see also: http://www.nasul.tv/2012/03/08/t-basescu-politicul-e-mic-dar-justitia-e-totusi-deasupra-lui/

(22) Doru Pop, Obsesiisociale, (Social Obsessions) European Institute, Iasi, 1998.

(23) M.-F. Bacque: Pourquoi la cremation resiste sur le plan psychologique en France, in Etudes sur la mort, 2007/2 (no. 132), pp. 47-54

(24) http://alexandru.ulea.ro/?p=2969

(25) Cf.: David le Breton, Anthropologie du corps et modernite, Presses Universitaires de France, 1990. Alain Corbin, Jean-Jacques Courtine, Georges Vigarello (coord.), Lhistoire du corps, Editions du Seuil, 2006.

(26) The struggle of the cremationists for legitimating themselves in an autonomous manner not in a relational one, like the opposite of Christian religion, is portrayed and explain in Marius Rotar's book. Marius Rotar, Op. cit.

(27) Cf.: I.C. Tesu, Inhumare versus incinerare (Burial versus Cremation), http://www.doxologia.ro/puncte-de- vedere/inhumare-versus-incinerare. V. Prelipcean, Incinerarea morsor si teologia ortodoxa (Cremation and Orthodox Theology), http://www.crestinortodox.ro/diverse/incinerarea-mortilor-teologia-ortodoxa-69379.html. G. Militaru, Incinerarea mortjlor, intre dorin{a muribundului si in vatatura Bisericii (Cremation, Between the Wish of the Dying and What the Church Teaches Us), http://prgabriel.wordpress.com/2008/09/29/incinerarea-mortilor-intre-dorinta-muribundului- si-invatatura-bisericii/

(28) All the aspects presented in the paper can be further researched in various directions, because they are subjects located at the crossroad between various fields. This time, we are trying to offer a general image on methods of social and imaginary interaction between cremation and elements of a social-political imaginary of death.

(29) For a more specific analyse upon the construction of death in mass-media, see Adriana Teodorescu: The Death of the Star. Social and Cultural Issues, in Annales Universitatis Apulensis. Series Historica, special issue, 2010, Dying and Death in 18th-21st Century Europe. International Conference, Third Edition, Alba Iulia, Romania, September 3-5, 2010, pp. 175-191.

(30) H. Gerard-Rosay, Devenir des traces apres cremation, in Etudes sur la mort 2004/1, No. 125, p. 105-117.

(31) Regis Debray, Vie et mort de l'image. Une histoire du regard en Occident, Gallimard, Paris, 2008. B. Bertherat, Cadavre a la <<une>> La television et la mort de Jacques Mesrine, ennemi public no. 1 (1979), in Le Temps des Medias, No. 1, 2003/1, pp. 119-138.

(32) Razvan Bucuroiu, Mantuirea prin Siemens Martin, in Romania Libera, 1994.

(33) http://www.napocanews.ro/2012/01/de-ce-nu-sunt-de-acord-cu-crematoriul-%E2%80%9Ehorthyist-din- cartierulmanastur.html

(34) http://www.ziarulfaclia.ro/mitropolitul-andrei-andreicut-biserica-ortodoxa-nu-a-fost-niciodata-de-acord-cu- incinerarea-defunctilor/

(35) http://www.buzznews.ro/2012/01/07/rdk-cremation-vrea-sa-incinerze-in-mana%C8%99tur-10-15-cadavre-umane-pe- zi%C8%99i-48-doar-%E2%80%9Cin-cazuri-extreme%E2%80%9D/.

(36) http://clujulnecenzurat.info/publ/evenimente/clujenii_nu_vor_crematoriu_in_manastur/12-1-0-7

(37) http://www.citynews.ro/cluj/eveniment-29/crematoriul-din-manastur-otrava-cu-mercur-pentru-clujeni-212787/.

(38) http://ziuadecj.realitatea.net/editorial/crematoriu-pentru-ticalosi--81590.html

(39) http://www.realitatea.net/cluj-napoca-crematoriul-uman-scoate-credinciosii-in-strada_902748.html.

(40) http://www.monitorulcj.ro/actualitate/9885-mars-al-tacerii-impotriva-crematoriului-uman; http://www.clon.ro/peste- 300-de-clujeni-au-protestat-impotriva-crematoriului-din-manastur/1039143

(41) For an updated journal on the way in which these protests were organised and have taken place see the page of the Amurg Cremationist Society. http://www.incinerareamurg.ro/noutati-news-2

(42) We are talking about the dynamic nature of politics, the fight between different parties, made possible by the theme of cremation: http://www.ziare.com/cluj-napoca/stiri-actualitate/usl-cluj-cere-prefecturii-sa-revoce-hotararea-de- consililiulocal-care-face-posibila-amenajarea-crematoriului-din-manastur-2714012; http://www.ziare.com/cluj-napoca/stiriactualitate/pdl-cluj-ii-acuza-pe-liderii-usl-ca-au-participat-pentru-voturi-la- mitingul-impotriva-crematoriului-din-manastur2714384

(43) http://www.citynews.ro/cluj/eveniment-29/crematoriul-din-manastur-incinge-spiritele-in-cluj-212742/.

(44) http://adormireamaiciidomnului.wordpress.com/2012/01/17/memoriu-catre-primarie-al-parohiei-adormirea- maiciidomnului/

(45) http://www.napocanews.ro/2012/01/de-ce-nu-sunt-de-acord-cu-crematoriul-%E2%80%9Ehorthyist-din- cartierulmanastur.html

(46) http://www.adevarul.ro/locale/cluj-napoca/Consilierii_PDL_Cluj Napoca_nu_mai_vor_crematoriu_in_Manastur_0_626937558.html

Marius ROTAR

"1 Decembrie 1918" University of Alba Iulia

E-mail: mrotar2000@yahoo.com

Adriana TEODORESCU

"1 Decembrie 1918" University of Alba Iulia

E-mail: adriana.teodorescu@gmail.com