On the Problem of Contacts of the Living with the Deceased: How the Deceased Protect Themselves from the Living

Abstract

This article is based on field data from the Russian North. Its subject is the problem of the relationship between the living and the deceased. The main goal of the article is to show how dream stories transform the Russian peasants’ idea idea that deceased persons can visit their living kin in order to continue their family life together, including sexual relations. This mythological plot, which often causes real fear among people who have lost relatives, is mirrored in dream stories. On the one hand, the appearance of the deceased in a dream is associated with the expectation of the dreamer’s imminent death. On the other, stories are recorded about dreams where the deceased husband refuses to take his wife with him to the world of the dead or even tries to get rid of her. The reluctance of the deceased to take his living relative with him can be explained by the desire to preserve the border between the world of the living and the world of the dead. For protection from the living, the deceased use the same strategies as do the living to protect themselves against the dead relatives when they come. These strategies include: 1) escape (upon seeing a living relative, the dead goes away); 2) declaring the absence of suitable housing (the deceased husband has nowhere to bring his wife); 3) expulsion with the help of aggression, primarily obscene swearing.