Cemeteries, Virtual

A virtual cemetery is a database search term identifying a wide range of cemetery-related interests on the Internet. They include cemetery locations, cemetery records, headstone photos, tours of local and historical cemeteries, burial sites of the famous, and online memorialization of the dead. Related sites deal with end-of-life controversies, consumer rights, death humor, genealogical information, unusual techniques of body disposal, and commercial services including rental caskets and help in composing a eulogy. An Internet search identifies over 250,000 sites on one search engine and over 7 million on another. More specifically, virtual cemeteries are sites at which survivors post online memorials and where family, friends, and the merely curious visit and leave comments. Posting a memorial at some sites is free, others charge a nominal fee, and typically there is an index or grid to help the user find a specific memorial. Judging by the number of visitors, virtual cemeteries are busy places. This entry describes a typical site, suggests reasons for the popularity of these memorials, and identifies those most likely to be memorialized on them.

Cyberspace Cemeteries

There are many cyberspace cemeteries with many thousands of posted memorials and millions of so-called reflections attached to them. Reflections for any one individual often number in the hundreds. There are many common features to these postings. Typically the site opens with a photo and a quote such as from an inspirational book. Several click-on buttons are used to direct the reader to a biography, perhaps a set of photos, and a section in which comments may be left by visitors to the site. Anyone can read these messages, but they are often required to enter a name, e-mail address, and location before posting comments. Some of these messages may be addressed to the family, some to the deceased, and others to the world at large. Many such comments pertain to the attractiveness and meaningfulness of a memorial, whereas others can best be described as narratives of shared grief.

Many who purchase online memorials check them regularly, even daily, to read the newest posting. In so doing, some users have discovered relatives they did not know they had and found friends long out of touch. Many say they learned new things about the deceased. An electronic community of family, friends, and strangers is thus created and, according to some site operators, these networks sometimes continue as old friendships are renewed and new ones formed.

Virtual cemeteries for pets are also common, and they are filled with memories and expressions of love as compelling as those posted for people. Like human sites, they contain commemorations, poems, and photographs, and, like human memorials, those for pets are funny, sad, and touching. The memorialized include cats and dogs, of course, but also turtles, birds, horses, and in one instance a collection of snails. Animals are as missed as people and in the electronic public square that a virtual cemetery is, their absence is as mourned as that of any person.

Explanations for Popularity of Cyberspace Cemeteries

There are various explanations for the recent popularity of these cemeteries. First, contemporary families are scattered and mobile, and e-mail and shared digitalized photos are a logical preliminary for those inclined to go the next step and create an online memorial. Second, more people now choose cremation and scattering ashes, a practice that leaves survivors without a tactile place to pay tribute, to communicate with the dead, or to imagine a loved one resting nearby but residing in a better place. Third, the heaven of the Western imagination has always been a utopia populated by beings immune to the effects of earth, air, fire, and water, and, appropriately, the texture of its cyber equivalent is a weave of ones and zeros, the lightest of conceptual particles, a suitably modern image for escape from the [Page 181]degradation of physicality and decay. The seeming miracle of it, some have noted, is that as cyber presences, the dead can be addressed directly in the perfected electronic ether they inhabit. Technologically revolutionary, cyberspace is yet mythically and poetically familiar, a new venue for expressing traditional themes of hope, resurrection, and safety.

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