Where Airy Voices Lead

This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Buy on Amazon Buy on Waterstones.com
*This page contains affiliate links, so we may earn a small commission when you make a purchase through links on our site at no additional cost to you.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app

1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date 29 May 2020 | Archive Date 28 May 2020
John Hunt Publishing Ltd | https://www.johnhuntpublishing.com/o-books/

Talking about this book? Use #WhereAiryVoicesLead #NetGalley. More hashtag tips!


Description

The only book to comprehensively describe the varying historical and contemporary cultural beliefs in immortality globally, including western, eastern and animist traditions.

Many have pursued, and continue to pursue, real immortality by seeking to prolong their lives on this earth. Others pursue symbolic or proxy immortality, through children, fame or being part of something long-lasting. One can imagine these different forms of immortality as a menu of options of how to live forever: you click the one that appeals to you most and best fits your beliefs, hopes, values and worldview.


The only book to comprehensively describe the varying historical and contemporary cultural beliefs in immortality globally, including western, eastern and animist traditions.

Many have pursued...


A Note From the Publisher

Piotr Bienkowski's disciplinary background is as an archaeologist and museum curator. He has been Professor of Archaeology and Museology at the University of Manchester, Director of Manchester Museum, Chair of the North West Federation of Museums and Galleries, and before that Head of Antiquities at National Museums Liverpool. For many years, he was editor of Levant, the journal of the Council for British Research in the Levant, and editor of the British Academy Monographs in Archaeology series.

While professor at Manchester, he developed and taught a Masters course on Immortality: from Gilgamesh to the Post-modern, that was a component of the interdisciplinary MA in Constructions of the Holy, the Sacred and the Supernatural in the School of Arts, Histories and Cultures. It was while creating and teaching that course that he developed the ideas that are in this proposal, and the structure of the proposed book.

Much of his interest in this topic developed in extensive work he did with indigenous groups from Australia, New Zealand and North America around the repatriation of the human remains of their ancestors from British museums. This resulted in numerous discussions, seminars and workshops on different cultural and philosophical perspectives on death and the afterlife. He published several academic papers and book chapters on these aspects, in the context of the treatment of ancient human remains, which incorporated cultural and philosophical perspectives on death and immortality.

He has published 15 books and around 50 peer-reviewed papers in academic journals and books, as well as around 80 other publications. He now runs a cultural consultancy working in the UK and Europe. He is a leading authority on the archaeology of Jordan, and directs an excavation in Petra.

Piotr Bienkowski's disciplinary background is as an archaeologist and museum curator. He has been Professor of Archaeology and Museology at the University of Manchester, Director of Manchester...


Advance Praise

Where Airy Voices Lead is impressively global in scope, yet exceedingly nuanced in its appraisal and strikingly dispassionate in tone. Bienkowski’s history demonstrates that any culture’s afterlife beliefs reflect the values of that society. He challenges the reader by arguing that, although none of these types of immortality can be proved, equally none can be dismissed and are deserving of respect and investigation. He concludes that our attitude toward immortality is an ethical choice.


Brian Schmidt, Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Mediterranean West Asian Cultures, The University of Michigan, author of Israel's Beneficent Dead 

Where Airy Voices Lead is impressively global in scope, yet exceedingly nuanced in its appraisal and strikingly dispassionate in tone. Bienkowski’s history demonstrates that any culture’s afterlife...


Available Editions

EDITION Paperback
ISBN 9781785356384
PRICE £15.99 (GBP)

Available on NetGalley

Send to Kindle (PDF)