About the Research Group
Northwestern University's Death Studies Research Group, funded by the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities, creates a network for scholars and students interested in the human encounter with death and recognizing death as a universal and important part of the human experience.
By allowing for those interested in death studies to share their research and experiences with each other, the research group will explore ways in which death and dying are understood by different religions and cultures; bereavement and loss, particularly factors affecting the experience and expression of grief; death attitudes and education; historical and current approaches to death rituals and mourning practices; attitudes toward final disposition, particularly relative to environment and urban planning; the relationship between changes in the material contexts of mortality and social responses to it; the role of death in ethical self-fashioning; and relationships between the dead and the living. With our close temporal proximity to the COVID-19 pandemic—whether we are or are not on the other side of this global tragedy—this workshop will build community across the university not only for its scholars and practitioners, but to address a growing public interest in mortality and death experience.
Co-conveners
Catherine Belling (Associate Professor of Medical Education)
Jeanne Dunning (Professor of Art Theory and Practice)
Sean Hanretta (Associate Professor of History)
Joshua Hauser (Associate Professor of Medicine and Medical Education)
Mel Keiser (Independent Artist and Spring 2021 Kaplan Artist in Residence)
Jeanne Dunning (Professor of Art Theory and Practice)
Sean Hanretta (Associate Professor of History)
Joshua Hauser (Associate Professor of Medicine and Medical Education)
Mel Keiser (Independent Artist and Spring 2021 Kaplan Artist in Residence)