Death and the media...

Joint event organised by the Media Study Group and Social Aspects of Death, Dying and Bereavement Study Group

15th November, 10:30am - 4:30pm

BSA London Meeting Room, Imperial Wharf

Theme: Death and the Media

In a time of 24/7 news channels, easy access to the internet and a burgeoning celebrity culture, death is an important source of news for journalism. Framed by ongoing discussions about the visibility of death within Western Society, death in the media adds an interesting and valuable contribution to debates about death denial and death as taboo.

This symposium will bring together academics from Sociology and associated disciplines to consider the coverage of death in the media and what this may reveal about the status of death in contemporary society more generally. Papers on the day will cover popular images of death in tabloid journalism/magazines; news realism and the representation of “ordinary deaths”; accidental, extraordinary and sensational media accounts of death; news constructions of mourning; blogs and alternative (lay) views of death; the death of celebrities in the news; ethical issues in reporting /photographing death; compassion, morality and the reporting of death and suffering.

For further information and to book your place, click here...

Launch of the Association for the Study of Death & Society website...

Image: from a series of six engravings of memento mori by the German artist Alexander Mair, 1605, Monoscope

The Association for the Study for Death & Society (ASDS) has formally launched its website this month. The site features news and events, a photo gallery, profiles of the council members and regional representative of the Association, details of the DDD conference series, jobs, and links to other organisations. Additionally, members have access to discussion forums, a database of member’s research and teaching interests, and lists of member’s publications. Members are automatically listed in the database and receive favourable rates for the DDD conference series and the journal ‘Death Studies’.

ASDS promotes the study of death in the arts, humanities, social and allied sciences. To this end the Association will:

• Foster and promote publication, conferences and multidisciplinary networks
• Support academic professional development
• Promote high quality, ethical research
• Shape and influence policy and practice agendas
• Support the teaching of death studies
• Promote the widespread recognition of death studies
• Represent the interests of the membership

If you would like more information about ASDS and how to become a member, visit the website at http://www.deathandsociety.org/index.php.

Shortage of space in cemeteries...

Photo: Andrew Fox/Corbis, The Guardian

Try not to die if you live in the London boroughs of Tower Hamlets or Hackney – the councils don't have anywhere to put you. They are among a growing number of local authorities across Britain that have run out of burial space, or are close to it.

Some estimates suggest that by 2019 all 130 cemeteries in London and its outer areas will have run out of capacity. And it's not just the capital that is suffering. Last month the popular retirement area of Poole in Dorset said its two remaining cemeteries would run out of space within a year, while in Wales church leaders have warned of a "burial crisis", with a quarter of grounds already full and 43% with fewer than 20 spaces left.

The shortage – and the fact that councils are strapped for cash – is pushing up burial fees. Last month Glasgow increased the cost of a new plot from £658 to £1,076, and from £540 to £808 for burial in an existing family plot. Data from Cipfa, the organisation for accountants in the public sector, shows that between 2008 and 2009 the average fee for interments in the UK rose from £458 to £493, up 8.7%. The fee for burial outside your home borough rose even more, to £903 from £833.

Private operators are moving in to fill the gap – and this week saw the launch of "CemeteryInvest.com", which is offering plots for £875 at a new cemetery on the edge of Birmingham.

However, it is not targeting the bereaved or people trying to reserve a space for themselves – it is aimed at private investors, who, in effect, lease the land then sell later at a profit. It claims investors could make 60% in as little as two years, and can even put the investment into their pension.

"The concept is very simple. We allow investors to forward-purchase individual plots at a discounted rate. They are then managed by the cemetery and offered back to the public at their usual market value upon completion of the landscaping in 2012, providing you with the returns," says promoter Alex Ogden. He claims nearby local cemeteries are selling space for between £1,480 and £1,600, so buying at £875 today will give investors almost guaranteed returns.

But there are risks. This is not a business regulated by the Financial Services Authority, so it is unsupervised, and there is no access to compensation should anything go wrong.

For the full story, see here...

Contesting Human Remains in Museum Collections...

Photo: Morbid Curiosity, taken at the Manchester Museum

To be published on 22nd October, Dr Tiffany Jenkins' book examines the crisis of cultural authority within museums:

Since the late 1970s human remains in museum collections have been subject to claims and controversies, such as demands for repatriation by indigenous groups who suffered under colonization. These requests have been strongly contested by scientists who research the material and consider it unique evidence.

This book charts the influences at play on the contestation over human remains and examines the construction of this problem from a cultural perspective. It shows that claims on dead bodies are not confined to once colonized groups. A group of British Pagans, Honouring the Ancient Dead, formed to make claims on skeletons from the British Isles. And ancient human remains, bog bodies and Egyptian mummies, which have not been requested by any group, have become the focus of campaigns initiated by members of the profession, at times removed from display in the name of respect.

By drawing on empirical research including extensive interviews with the claims-making groups, ethnographic work, document, media, and policy analysis, Contesting Human Remains in Museum Collections demonstrates that strong internal influences do in fact exist. The only book to examine the construction of contestation over human remains from a sociological perspective, it advances an emerging area of academic research, setting the terms of debate, synthesizing disparate ideas, and making sense of a broader cultural focus on dead bodies in the contemporary period.

Digital Death Day...

Digital Death Day

9th October, 9am - 5pm

The Centre for Creative Collaboration

The University of London



Death is a part of life and life has (to an extent) become digital.

This un-conference will be primarily concerned with provoking discourse around the social, cultural and practical implications of Death in the Digital World. Thus stimulating a reconsideration of how death, mourning, memories and history are currently being augmented in our technologically mediated society.

The archiving, networking and post mortem engagement of ‘digital remains’ leads us to consider what place digital information has in our lives legally, sentimentally and historically.

For further details, see here...

Excellent news...

Image: the Coffin Works, Jewellery Quarter

Last year, I blogged about the Newman Brothers Coffin Works in Birmingham and the cuts in national public funding which led to regional development agency Advantage West Midlands, which owned the site, to pull out restoring the building as a museum. However, the building has now been purchased by the Birmingham Conservation Trust as a result of a £150,000 grant from Birmingham City Council. For more on this story and the future of the Coffin Works, see here...

Don't forget to floss...

An interesting photo set taken within an abandoned dentist's clinic - for more see here...

Zombie studies...

Image: DiabloRose

It is a class to die for - Zombie studies is now on the curriculum at the University of Baltimore. The new course, which promises to "get you ready for a zombie apocalypse", invites students to devour classic zombie films and comics. Instead of essays, they write horror scripts or draw storyboards for their ideal monster movie. The minor class, titled English 333, has already been dubbed "Zombie 101" by the Baltimore Sun newspaper.

It was introduced to meet a demand for "interesting, off-the-wall" courses for a new minor in pop culture, according to Jonathan Shorr, chairman of the university's school of communications design.

"It's a back door into a lot of subjects," he told the Baltimore Sun. "They think they're taking this wacko zombie course, and they are. But on the way, they learn how literature and mass media work, and how they come to reflect our times."

For more details, see here the BBC website here...

For the Love of...

Image: For the Love of Chocolates by Valerie N'Doye, Show Me

A cheeky take on Damien Hirst's infamous diamond-encrusted skull, For the Love of Chocolate features in the exhibition Double Take at Worthing Museum and Art Gallery which runs until September 25, 2010.

New book on dark tourism...

Image: the wreckage of the World Trade Centre, Steve McCurry

Edited by Philip Stone and Richard Sharpley of the Dark Tourism Forum, Tourist Experience: Contemporary Perspectives features three chapters dedicated to thanatourism. Set to be published in September, you can pre-order a copy here!