Narratives of Parental Death, Dying and Bereavement : A Kind of Haunting

This collection shows what happens when facing the inevitable and sometimes expected death of a parent, and how such an ordinary part of life as parental death might connect with the children left behind. In many ways, individual deaths are extraordinary and leave a unique legacy - a kind of haunting. The authors' accounts seek to make sense of death through witnessing its enactment and recording its detail. All the authors are experienced researchers in the field of death studies, and their collective expertise encompasses ethnography, psychology, sociology and anthropology. The individual descriptions of death and grief capture the everyday practicalities of managing death and dying, including, for example, the difficulties of caring responsibilities and the realities of dealing with strained family relationships. These accounts show the raw detail of death; they are deeply personal observations framed within critical theories. As established scholars and practitioners that have researched and worked in end-of-life and bereavement care, the authors in this anthology offer a unique perspective on how identity is shaped by a close bereavement. The book employs a strong editorial narrative that blends memoir with theoretical engagement, and will be of interest to death studies scholars, as well as practitioners involved in end-of-life care and bereavement care and anyone who has experienced the death of a parent. Caroline Pearce is a Visiting Researcher at the Palliative and End of Life Care Group, University of Cambridge, UK. Carol Komaromy is a medical sociologist who has worked extensively in both NHS clinical practice and academia. She served as co-editor of the journal Mortality and was a founding member of the Association of Death and Society. Carol has retired from full-time work but is an honorary associate of The Open University, UK Foreword Reference Acknowledgements Contents Notes on Contributors 1: Introduction: Narrating Death Death, Dying and Bereavement: A Personal, Clinical and Academic Arena The Quality of Dying: ‘Good’ and ‘Bad’ Deaths Bereavement and Parental Loss Family Practices at the End-of-Life and in Bereavement Experience and Knowledge Autobiography and Memory Narrating Death Our Own Positioning Outline of the Book References 2: A Kind of Haunting A Death of Contrasts: Mom’s Death References 3: A Death Recalled Post Mortem: Early Warnings Homecoming No Longer Dad Making Decisions Last Night in Cambridge Carling House Castle Hill Hospital One of the Bereaved A Cambridge Funeral Back to Work References 4: Continuing and Emerging Bonds: Working Through Grief as a Daughter and an Academic References 5: A Bittersweet Legacy Looking Back (for the First Time, with a Purpose) He Didn’t Go Gently, Ever Mother Love Mortality as a Fact of Life 6: Two Traumatic Bereavements I II III 7: Death, Dislocation and Discovery over Five (or Should that Be Six or Even Seven?) Decades Introduction My First Encounter with ‘Doing Death’ Aftermath Re-engaging with Death Continuity, Distance and Dislocation Social Class Gaining Analytical Purchase Conclusion References 8: Bereavement, Sacred-Secrecy and Dreams Rationale Accepting Invitations Writing Not Speaking Parental Cameos Absent Details Personal Cameo Opacity Sacred-Secrecy Treasured Features Identities Sacralised Personhood, Dividuality over Individuality Dreamtime Selves Concluding with Life References 9: Conclusion: Recovering Ghosts Stories and Silences The Limits of Shared Experience Dys-appearing Performing Death Hauntings and Becomings Recovering Ghosts References Index