Every individual experiences the act of death, and most people experience the death of someone they know. Be it family members, relatives or someone infamous, the living go through the process of dying. Anthropology seeks to understand the universal process of death ritual and how different cultures deal with death differently. An anthropologist can extract the social values ​​of a given culture, past or present, from the way the death ceremony is practiced. Such values ​​might concern the political hierarchy or status of an individual in a society and the spiritual or religious faith of a culture. By exploring the death ceremony in ancient Egypt, contemporary Hindu death practice in India, and current North American funerary rites, anthropology can be shown to be conducive to providing clarity to the social division of a culture's strata and spiritual beliefs by analyzing the ritual of death. Universally, these rituals are ultimately designed for the living, who almost collectively seek longevity of life and immortality of being. Ancient Egypt is well known for its rituals and cures revolving around the dying process and the movement from the physical being to the afterlife. Preparations for death were planned well in advance (Murnane in Obayashi, 1992, p. 35). From this an anthropologist might infer that death and the process of dying were prized and of great importance to the ancient Egyptians. Such a statement can be made because of the astronomical amount of time and energy that the ancient Egyptians spent processing bodies via mummification, as well as the mass burial chambers built for the deceased. Sarcophagi and funerary masks were also made to honor and help the dead transcend into the afterlife. Anthropologists (often archaeologists) can verify what... half of the article... work, NY: Continuum.Elmore, M. (2006). Contemporary Hindu approaches to death: Living with the dead. In K. Garces-Foley (Ed.), Death and religion in a changing world (pp. 23-43). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, Inc. Garces-Foley, K., & Holcomb, J. S. (2006). Contemporary American Funerals: Personalizing Tradition. In K. Garces-Foley (Ed.), Death and religion in a changing world (pp. 207-225). Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, Inc. Huntington, R., & Metcalf, P. (1991). Death celebrations: The anthropology of mortuary ritual (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Murnane, W. J. (1992). Taking it with you: The problem of death and the afterlife in ancient Egypt. In H. Obayashi (ed.), Death and the Afterlife: Perspectives on World Religions. New York, NY: Praeger Publishers.Olcott, M. (1944). The caste system in India. American Sociological Journal, Vol. 9(6), 648-657.De