SAFETYLIT WEEKLY UPDATE

We compile citations and summaries of about 400 new articles every week.
RSS Feed

HELP: Tutorials | FAQ
CONTACT US: Contact info

Search Results

Journal Article

Citation

Black A. Suicide Life Threat. Behav. 1990; 20(4): 285-306.

Affiliation

American Ethnic Studies Department, University of Washington, Seattle 98195.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1990, American Association of Suicidology, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

2087766

Abstract

This paper takes exception to much of the literature on Jonestown. The authors of this literature claim that an explanation of the mass suicide in Jonestown requires an understanding of how its residents came to a common consciousness. Such an analysis implies that the residents of Jonestown died for essentially the same reason. This paper, using Durkheim's typology of suicides, demonstrates that the residents of Jonestown died for very different reasons and that two types of suicide occurred simultaneously on November 18, 1978: altruistic and fatalistic. Some of the residents of Jonestown died because they put the group above the self; they committed altruistic suicide. The majority, however, died for fatalistic reasons. Jonestown in fact had become a hopeless, demeaning, and antagonistic environment. The analysis here suggests caution to those who assume that a mass suicide is necessarily a homogeneous event.

NEW SEARCH


All SafetyLit records are available for automatic download to Zotero & Mendeley
Print