Noun – 1) a piece of clothing that is used as a coat that has no sleeves and that is worn over the shoulders and attached at the neck
2) a thing that hides or covers someone or something
The word is used in the Shawl by Louise Erdrich which can find on second to the last paragraph.
First, I told him that keeping his sister’s shawl was wrong, because we never keep the clothing of the dead. Now’s the time to burn it, I said. Send it off to cloak her spirit. And he agreed.
The narrator is talking to his father about not to keep the shawl of his dead aunt’s shawl. My understanding of the paragraph is that, according to their cultural believe, they do not keep the clothes of the dead. Burning her clothes (her belongings –shawl) mean send the shawl to her so that she can use it to cover her spirit on the other side.
