{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,2,15]],"date-time":"2026-02-15T03:37:04Z","timestamp":1771126624668,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":62,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"5","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2013,8,29]],"date-time":"2013-08-29T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1377734400000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/page\/policies\/text-and-data-mining-license"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Transcult Psychiatry"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2013,10]]},"abstract":"<jats:p> Maternal reactions to infant death in Northeast Brazil have been at the epicenter of anthropological debate since the 1980s. This ethnographic study of 45 death narratives by bereaved mothers collected from 1979\u20131989 in Pacatuba, Cear\u00e1, Brazil, refutes existing claims of mothers\u2019 \u201cselective neglect\u201d and \u201cindifference\u201d towards sick babies and emotionally empty grief response. I argue that through dead-baby dreams\u2014and their imaginary transfiguration\u2014grieving mothers alleviate infant death trauma. Feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, definitive loss, and personal guilt\u2014the social seeds of depression\u2014are reframed to deny death\u2019s finality and exonerate mothers from crippling self-blame. By transfiguring lingering mental images of the tiny cold corpse, mothers remold the irreversibility and definitiveness of death, gaining a sense of control over its unpredictable \u201cjolt.\u201d In the politically oppressive Northeast Brazil\u2014where social justice remains \u201can illusion\u201d\u2014mothers dream to preserve their own mental sanity and to recover from death\u2019s cruel aftermath. Any interpretation of mourning behavior must be contextualized within the local moral world and its \u201cassumed structure of reality\u201d to avoid demoralizing grieving Brazilian mothers and compounding their suffering. \u201cYou see, the only thing a poor woman truly owns that no one can borrow, cheat, steal or rob from her\u2009\u2026\u2009is her imagination!\u201d ( Dona Chiquinha grieving death of her 10 children, Pacatuba, Cear\u00e1, Brazil). <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/1363461513497501","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2013,8,30]],"date-time":"2013-08-30T03:23:19Z","timestamp":1377832999000},"page":"662-682","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":13,"title":["Dead-baby dreams, transfiguration and recovery from infant death trauma in northeast Brazil"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"50","author":[{"given":"Marilyn","family":"Nations","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"University of Fortaleza"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2013,8,29]]},"reference":[{"key":"bibr1-1363461513497501","volume-title":"An\u00e1lise de conte\u00fado","author":"Bardin L.","year":"1979"},{"key":"bibr2-1363461513497501","first-page":"29","volume":"97","author":"Benedict R.","year":"1923","journal-title":"American Anthropologist"},{"key":"bibr3-1363461513497501","first-page":"29","volume-title":"Trauma and life stories: International perspectives","author":"BenEzer G.","year":"1999"},{"issue":"1","key":"bibr4-1363461513497501","first-page":"173","volume":"23","author":"Bezerra J. 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