cohort, women have a similar discrepancy: 0.67 for Asians, 1.26 for Whites, 2.24 for
Native Americans, and 2.75 for African Americans. The leading cause of death is can-
cer for all women and Asian men, accidents for White and Native American men,
and HIV for black men (National Center for Education Statistics, 2006).
Globally, leading causes of death vary from what we experience in the United
States. Common diarrhea is the sixth leading cause of mortality throughout the world,
killing roughly 1.8 million people each year.
Tuberculosis, largely a treatable disease in the United States, is the seventh lead-
ing cause of death around the world (World Health Organization, 2003). Living con-
ditions, clean water, access to medicine and medical care, and other sociological
factors affect these rankings.
Death is an individual event, but it is also a sociological phenomenon. Whether
people die unexpectedly or not, a huge network of legal, social, economic, and reli-
gious structures come into play to establish memorials, negotiate inheritances and
financial affairs, assist with the grieving process, and make sense of the death.
Psychologist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (1969, 1981) counseled many people with
incurable diseases and concluded that people faced with imminent death go through
five stages. It is the job of counselors to guide them through the stages to the last stage,
acceptance:
1.Denial.At first they cannot believe they are going to die. They think, “Obviously
the doctor made a mistake.” They avoid the topic and situations that remind
them of it.2.Anger.In this stage, they acknowledge that they will die but see their death as
unjust: “I don’t deserve this.”3.Negotiation.Next people try to bargain with God, or fate, or even with the dis-
ease itself: “Give me one more year with my family. Don’t take me until after
Christmas.”4.Depression.People become resigned to death, but they grieve because they have
no power to change the fact that their life is about to end.5.Acceptance.In this final stage, people come to terms with their death. They put
their affairs in order. They may express regret at what they didn’t do when they
had the chance.Since these stages were first proposed,
though, sociologists have pointed out that this
process varies among different groups, as do
the meanings attached to dying (see Riley,
1983). Other cultures have a different view of
death: For some it is simply the next phase of
life and to be welcomed; for others, it is a
“fact” and accepted more readily. Just as dif-
ferent groups view death differently, different
cultures have developed different rituals to
commemorate death.
Every culture treats death as a special
event, and death and mourning are often
linked to religious beliefs. There is archeolog-
ical evidence that the earliest humans stained
the bodies of the dead with red ochre before
AGE AND IDENTITY 361Life stage rituals, including
death, incorporate different
cultural traditions. Here
dancers perform a Dragon
Dance in front of a coffin
during a traditional Han
funeral.n