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Podcast: Seriously...
Episode: Songs for the Dead
Description: Keeners were the women of rural Ireland who were traditionally paid to cry, wail and sing over the bodies of the dead at funerals and wakes. Their role was to help channel the grief of the bereaved and they had an elevated, almost mythical status among their communities. The custom of keening had all but vanished by the 1950's as people began to view it as primitive, old-fashioned and uncivilised.Now, broadcaster Marie-Louise Muir sets out to ask what's been lost with the passing of the keeners.She travels to Inis Mor, a remote island...