Children of the Waters
In the Buddhist tradition, unborn children who die are 鈥榤izuko', meaning 鈥榗hildren of the waters鈥�. New Generation Thinker Sabina Dosani reflects on loss and mourning rituals.
An ancient Japanese Buddhist ritual which involves a red baby bib, a small statue and water, has been taken up by women wanting to have some way of marking a miscarriage and the life not lived. New Generation Thinker Sabina Dosani is a psychiatrist and writer doing research at the University of East Anglia. Her essay looks at the language we use for unborn children who die and at what we can learn about mourning rituals from the work of the 19th-century French sociologist Emile Durkheim, to modern services performed by Rabbis, in cathedrals and in peoples' back gardens.
Producer: Ruth Watts
Sabina Dosani is one of the ten New Generation Thinkers chosen in 2022 to work with 麻豆社 Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council to share their research. You can hear her in Free Thinking discussion episodes called Mental Health, Stepmothers and Depicting AIDS in Drama. All episodes of Free Thinking and this Essay series from New Generation Thinkers are available on 麻豆社 Sounds and to download as Arts & Ideas podcasts.
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- Tue 11 Apr 2023 22:45麻豆社 Radio 3
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