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Local virtue and global vision: The practice of eye donation in contemporary Sri Lanka
- Source :
- Medicine Anthropology Theory, Vol 4, Iss 4, Pp 150-170 (2020), Medicine anthropology theory, 2017, Vol.4(4), pp.150-170 [Peer Reviewed Journal]
- Publication Year :
- 2020
- Publisher :
- Edinburgh University Library, 2020.
-
Abstract
- A death radically rearranges kinship, debt, obligation, and responsibility, and it also triggers prescribed routines for mourning and material disposal of the corpse. It is into this complex and fraught unfolding of events that the rhetorics of corporeal charity must be introduced and acted upon. In this article, I describe practices and practicalities of cornea donation in Sri Lanka in relation to ideas about merit and the nation state. In contrast with discourses about ‘shortages’, corneas, which are often elsewhere a particularly difficult tissue to elicit because of their links to the eye, appearance, identity, and inner consciousness (Hayward and Madill 2003), are in Sri Lanka not in short supply. Nor is religion an impediment to donation but rather, the day-to-day practice of Sinhala Buddhists provides an extremely compelling affective, moral, and political justification when it comes to pledging to donate. The article illustrates how and why this is the case.
- Subjects :
- Medicine (General)
Engineering
Virtue
buddhism
business.industry
media_common.quotation_subject
education
Buddhism
Identity (social science)
Environmental ethics
GN1-890
humanities
sri lanka
Politics
R5-920
Anthropology
Donation
nationalism
Nation state
Kinship
Obligation
meritorious giving
business
eye donation
media_common
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 2405691X
- Volume :
- 4
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Medicine Anthropology Theory
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....9f63c02366ebd4ad2e3b834cca18e320