“Working on death connects me to the living”: with the Bizarreum, Juliettes Cazes popularizes the funeral

To miss. In your work you wear more than one hat. How would you present yourself in a nutshell?

Juliette Cazes. I’m Juliette Cazes, I’m 32 and every day I am independent researcher in thanatology… In addition to other assigned missions that allow me to feed and lodge! But most of my work and thought focuses on death and some sciences that revolve around it such as archeology, anthropology and, of course, history more generally.

To miss. How did you come to this sector of thanatology?

Since I was a child I have been passionate about funerals. Like many children, I became interested in classical archeology and this interest has stayed with me over the years! I studied the consequences, archeology and anthropology, because I was interested in knowing how the ancients buried others, for example how to read skeletons and bones … When I finished these studies, I realized that, given the current state of research , particularly in the humanities, it would be difficult for me to continue as a researcher. Soon after, I graduated in tourism and worked in this field for five years.

In my spare time, at the same time, I kept doing what I was passionate about: working at funerals, but I was no longer in academia. I was a free spirit, which wasn’t always easy in terms of recognition, but that’s what I wanted to do!

To miss. How it was born the Bizarre ?

To the base, the Bizarre it was a private facebook page for my friends. I had worked in museums, done internships and wanted to share what I saw, but my friends weren’t very receptive! I said to myself in 2017: Why not try a YouTube channel? “. I had never thought of becoming a videographer, but I knew that the video would allow me to reach a wide audience. I inquired about what existed in France, I wanted to create a French media that talked about death, with archeology, history…

Gradually it became a transmedia with videos, articles, podcasts, a site … All about death and the rites that surround it.

In 2020, when the Covid crisis hit the tourism sector hard, I lost my job. To recover, I reconciled my two professions: I created a travel planning agency and became a self-employed person for my thanatology activities as a freelancer. The bizarre, which was the name of my site, has become a registered trademark. I have focused my work on writing specific books or content, I work as a university teacher and for the general public I offer podcasts, online courses, videos …

It took me a long time to create my identity: talking about death ago people expected to see occult, voyeurism, dark things in my videos. But today things are clear: the Bizarreit is anthropology, history, archeology and a pinch of novelty around the funeral!

To miss. The subjects of the funeral or mortality can be support for anxieties, projections. How do you experience the point of view of others on your profession?

The question of my job is often the one I fear the most and then I’m happy enough when people don’t ask me!

There are different types of reactions when I talk about it. I have been subjected to rather heavy taunts, there are also people who fear my closeness to the theme of death, it depends on each one and on their own beliefs. Occasionally, I am also asked very personal questions how “ Have you ever had traumatic experiences to explain my interest in these issues. It is extremely inappropriate! Researchers are not always intimately connected to their research topic. I have lived through a difficult bereavement, but thanatology has never been considered a pain relief, I separate research and personal life, my experience and my affection are not meant to justify the existence of my work. .

There are also people who have a very false image of me: they think that I am super dark, that I have very macabre tastes, when in reality nothing at all! Just because I work on death doesn’t mean I’m dark. It is a constant chore to show that there is nothing bizarre or unhealthy about going through the funeral, and so on. it is a relatively classic subject in the human sciences.

But most of the time it goes very well: I try to assess whether people want to talk about it or not, I defuse it by making jokes or, on the contrary, by listening to them.

I was raised by parents who supported me a lot, whatever my interests, and who above all taught me not to worry about the opinions of others. I am quite closed to the opinion of others, even if I do not tolerate gratuitous evil. Also, I can’t blame people for being curious or scared: these are subjects in which there is a lot of affection.

To miss. You study funeral rites from all over the world. Does this lead you to question the relationship with death we have today in mainland France, and perhaps more broadly in the West?

Comparative studies are at the heart of my work and it is very important not to be ethnocentric. This raises a lot of questions!

In the West, after the end of the Second World War, there is much less talk of death: in the past, death was part of the home, of the social circle, of the village. There was a transition that made the hospital much more present later in the 1960s and that averted death. It is relatively recent. In the funerary history of the West, death is very present in everyday life, and in a natural way.

Today we also have an image of funeral directors run by men. But when you dig a little deeper, you realize that in funerary history, in France in particular, women played a very important role in rituals in rural areas, for example!

To miss. Do you also have a degree in funeral counseling?

Yes enough. I obtained the national diploma of funeral consultant and master of ceremonies in 2020. I was often told that I should work in the funeral home, since my work was related to funerals, and I decided to go and see what he looked like!

I really enjoyed this experience and, above all, I learned a lot on the job, even though I didn’t want to become a full-time funeral director. However, he completed my studies in archeology: making certain gestures, understanding the way in which a body is manipulated or how to gently rotate it while standing alone, it opened up lines of vision and reflection on technical gestures that probably have not moved for 3,000 years. it’s more!

To miss. Do you recognize yourself in the Death Positive movement in the United States?

Movement positive death was born in the 2010s and was popularized by Caitlin Doughty. He is a person with a very strong online presence who works in the funeral industry in the United States. She said it once in a tweet death was as taboo as sex, and we were talking about it positive sex. Why not talk about it positive death ? This is how the movement was born and it has amassed millions of views on the Internet.

When I discovered the existence of this movement, I wondered if it would arrive in France a few years later. To some extent, I have participated in it ever since my work is about death, and that I find important to get out of the taboo that surrounds it.

But today, in the United States, I have the impression that it is not only positive: behind the term, there is a new forge of injunctions, but also the goal of selling commercial services. This has given rise to new professions of death, not necessarily legislative, and it is complicated… Because we are still dealing with a clientele that is suffering, in mourning, or in total bewilderment. We are beginning to see the premises also in France.

I don’t claim it because whatever happens, the story of American funerals is very different from the story of French funerals. The social issues, the laws, the context are very different.

To miss. Are there any topics that particularly concern you in your research?

Juliette Cazes.With the Bizarreum I try above all to offer things to discover. I propose a fairly neutral and scientific tone, but I try, in my own way, to commit myself. For example, when I work on the subject of Aboriginal peoples, I try to raise awareness of cases like in Canada, where the remains of Aboriginal children were found in a residential school. These are important topics and, often, people are afraid to face them in traditional disclosure.

To miss. How would you describe the work at funerals and death?

Sometimes there are terrible stories that I have to deal with, which make me think that humanity is terrible. But I fight against this feeling because above the subjects, even if it is not easy to talk about death on a daily basis, I see a lot of beauty in the gestures of care, in people who take care of the dead, in all expressions of very strong feelings, even if at times diametrically opposed to ours.

Some stories are out of the ordinary, others are pretty mundane, but what I often say is this even if I work on death, for me I am surrounded by the living: even though these people are gone, their lives have existed and continue to exist through research. It is not because we are dead that we no longer exist, and I know that with this job I connect with others, much more than in any other job perhaps.