De Gruyter Necrodialogues and Media: Communicating with the Dead in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries

This volume is an original contribution to the understanding of the various forms of communication with the dead. Terming them "necrodialogues", it examines these forms of communication in relation to cultural and ritual practices of necromancy and mediumism on the one hand, and to the development of technologies for establishing contact with the beyond on the other. While recent scholarship in media and cultural studies rejects the narrative that technological progress in modernity eclipsed religious experiences and occult practices, twentieth- and twenty-first-century literary studies, holding on to the secularization paradigm, still largely dismiss practices of communication with the dead as anti-modern. By bringing together perspectives from different disciplines, this volume emphasizes the interconnectedness of literary necrodialogues and other cultural and media practices of communicating with the dead. The main aim of the collection is to explore the cultural, historical, anthropological, and media contexts in which modern necrodialogues are produced and invested with different meanings.