Taking it further
Less grave
We live longer now - but what are the chances of completely defying death?
Starting at the end
The deceased speak to us in ways you might find surprising - follow some deathly clues.
Digital traces
We all lead digital lives now - but does that online archive of our doings mean we'll also have a digital afterlife?
Help and Support
If you are experiencing bereavement, there are many organisations that offer advice and support.
Open University Courses
Death and Dying
How has the way society handles death changed over time? Where do most people die and who delivers care to dying people? Has palliative care radically transformed end-of-life care for all dying people? What are the ethical dilemmas that make decisions about care at the end-of-life so complex and how helpful are theoretical explanations about grief to bereaved people? This course considers these and other questions that concern all issues of death, dying and disposal practices.
Understanding Health and Social Care
This course provides an up-to-date, authoritative overview, with real-life case studies taking you deep into the experience of receiving care and working in care services.
Understanding Health
What can individuals do to maintain their health; and how the medical profession and politicians intervene to try to keep us healthy.
Working for Health
Explore everyday aspects of health in different cultural, historical and policy settings; consider some radical ways of enhancing health and health care; appreciate different models of health; and review your own and alternative standpoints.
Communication in Health and Social Care
Improving the quality of communication is now a key priority for health and social care: staff at all levels are expected to work in partnership with other agencies, and service users expect and demand greater equality in service provision. This more advanced course looks at communication in interpersonal, institutional and social contexts.
Weblinks
Organisations representing cemeteries and cermatoria in the UK
Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management
Federation of Cremation and Burial Authorities
Cremation Society of Great Britain
Organisations representing funeral directors
National Association of Funeral Directors
The National Society of Allied & Independent Funeral Directors
Natural Death Centre
Offers advice and support on family-organised, environmentally-friendly funerals, and Natural Burial Grounds.
Research Organisations
The Open University Birth and Death Research Group
Centre for Death and Society
British Sociological Association Study Group ‘Death, Dying and Bereavement’
Further Reading
Age Discrimination 1999: Turning Your Back on Us, London, report published by Age Concern.
The Hour of Our Death, by Philippe Aries (trans. H Weaver), published by Alfred A. Knopf.
“Post-disaster rituals” by A Ayres, in Grief, Mourning and Death Ritual, edited by Jenny Hockey, Jeanne Katz, and Neil Small, published by Open University Press.
“Between hope and acceptance: the medicalisation of dying”, article by David Clark in the British Medical Journal, vol. 324.
Better Palliative Care for Older People by Edward Davies and Irene Higginson, published by the World Health Organization.
Making Sense of Death, Dying and Bereavement: An Anthology, by Sarah Earle, Caroline Bartholomew and Carol Komaromy, The Open University Press.
Death and Dying: A Reader, edited by Sarah Earle, Carol Komaromy and Caroline Bartholomew, published by The Open University Press.
“Making sense of difference: death, gender and ethnicity in modern Britain” by David Field, J enny Hockey and Neil Small in Gender and Ethnicity edited by David Field, Jenny Hockey and Neil Small, published by Open University Press.
“Ethnicity and palliative care” by Y Gunaratnam) in Ethnicity and Nursing Practice by Lorraine Culley and Simon Dyson, published by Palgrave.
“Changing death rituals’” by Jenny Hockey in Grief, Mourning and Death Rituals, edited by J Hockey, J., Katz, and N Small, Open University Press.
Death and Dying, A Sociological Introduction by Glennys Howarth, published by Polity Press.
A Social History of Dying, by Allan Kellehear, Cambridge University Press.
The Dying Process: Patients’ Experiences of Palliative Care by Julia Lawton, published by Routledge.
Inequalities in Life and Death: What if Britain Were More Equal?, by Richard Mitchel, Mary Shaw and Daniel Dorling, The Policy Press.
The Revival of Death, Tony Walter, Routledge.
Content last updated: 26/05/2009
