Maternal Mortality and Rituals: Exploring Agency of the Dead Through a Haunted Malay Doctor

This paper discusses a belief narrative collected in 2018 that revolves around a Malay Muslim student doctor being haunted by the spirit of a woman who died in childbirth. A ritual was described as being performed by the doctor on advice from her mother who was a traditional midwife. In Islam, requesting for assistance through supernatural help other than the Islamic God is frowned upon and thus this usage of ritual would be considered “un-Islamic” in practice. After examining the history of Malay beliefs in birth spirits and rituals, alongside cultural as well as workplace expectations for student doctors, this paper suggests that traditional rituals such as the ones used in this belief narrative allow agency to the dead, which in turn, assists the living in coming to terms with unexpected deaths.