“An Examination of the Death and Dying of Companion Animals” explores the human-animal relationship as enacted in the home by becoming interspecies families. In particular, these relationships are considered when companion animals are dying and in need of special care and attention. This work provides historical and cultural context for how humans attend to animals in death and dying through the history of pet keeping and a complex literature review to explore the intersections of death and dying and religion, and human-animal studies. Specifically, models for companion animal end-of-life care replicate those services for humans by providing palliative care and a myriad of other treatments to attend to the suffering of aging and terminal pets. In addition to examining the creation of companion animal hospice and how it has quickly grown since the early 2000s, this work also confronts questions of euthanasia as a burdensome decision-making process. The decision to euthanize a loved one is fraught with ambiguity, uncertainty, and, at times, guilt. These experiences are idiosyncratic and by creating a discourse and popular platform through which to share these instances of death and dying, this project contributes to the newly established death positivity movement in drawing attention to caring for dead bodies in the home. This project ends by exploring after-death-care for companion animals. Burial and cremation are still, for the most part, how human families dispose of companion animal bodies. In addition to these more traditional forms of disposition, companion humans are also starting to preserve their companion animal bodies through taxidermy and freeze-drying. Though still considered grotesque by many companion humans, companion animal body preservation is just one example of new and reimagined mourning rituals. It is through these rituals and the recognition of this particular grief that the human-animal relationship in the home is seen in a new, complicated, ambiguous and intimate light. / Religion

This thesis aims to understand digital mourning practices on Italian Facebookpublic pages dedicated to bereavement, by studying how the users interact with eachother and the platform.Italian funerary rites are richly engraved in the culture, however, mourningpractices have been increasingly changing, especially in the last decade. Facebook andother Social Networking Sites play a major role in this transformation. In this thesisFacebook is considered as thanatechnology, a term introduced by Carla Sofka in SocialSupport “Internetworks,” Caskets for Sale, and More: Thanatology and the InformationSuperhighway to describe an interdisciplinary perspective of technologies used to getinformation and aid about topics related to death and bereavement (1997 p: 554). The literature review in this research shows that technology and death can be studiedthrough different lenses and with multidisciplinary approaches. Overall, the literaturereview here presented highlights some gaps: the lack of cultural specificity of thestudies and the scarce attention paid to digital communities created by users. Theseelements represent the basis of the thesis.In order to understand how mourning practices are conducted on digitalbereavement public pages the research draws theoretical notions mainly from MediaExistentialism which explains the use of these media as tools to explore life in relationto traumas, loss, grief and death (Lagerkvist, 2016, pp: 96-110). Furthermore,Continuing Bonds Theory (Field et al, 2006, p: 297) and Uses and Gratifications Theory(Katz et al, 1973, pp: 509-521) are used in order to enrich the theoretical landscape bytrying to understand the mechanisms of the behaviours observed.This thesis employs a methodology heavily based on netnography, laterexpanded by including visual analysis, supported by Roland Barthes’ semiotic theory (1964, pp:152-163). The results reveal how Italian Facebook public pages dedicated tobereavement can be understood as lifeline for those who are mourning a loss. Thefindings not only highlight the relationship between the theories mentioned before, butthey also show tight connection between the digital medium and how the mourner usesit: in order to keep a bond with the deceased the griever utilizes the SNS and adapts tothe logics of the medium. In this regard, the research also shows that the meaning oftraditional funerary symbols is sometimes kept intact in digital environments: they areindicators of certain beliefs, such as the idea that the dead reside within the technology, in a sort of heaven. This last aspect can be a starting point for further research in orderto gain better understanding of how digital mourning practices can impact local funerarytraditions: in particular how new and old forms of grieving are negotiated by themourners. Moreover, the increasingly growing body of research in death studies andcommunication suggests an interest in these practices.

In the following essay, one of grief’s central problems, namely its relation to consolation, is examined. Ancient philosophers’ answers to the question are compared with contemporary ones. Interestingly, although these answers and their theoretical frameworks largely differ, they seem to have one essential point in common, which is the idea that afterlife, understood either as metaphysical or non-metaphysical concept, lies at the core of what makes consolation intelligible. What is put into question in this essay is therefore this rather daring thing: does really the idea of afterlife, when faced with death, console grief, and if not, is there anything left to offer any consolation?

Over the course of the “Genji monogatari” (“The Tale of Genji,” c. 1008) narrative, roughly fifty characters die. The eponymous hero’s arc starts with the passing of his mother and ends as he himself succumbs to grief at being parted from his beloved Murasaki; the subsequent ten chapters of the text are likewise marked by successive personal losses. However, while the “Genji’s” plot is consistently catalyzed through encounters with death, it would be a mistake to say that the tale is about death: instead, it is the highly aestheticized scenes of grief experienced privately and communally by its characters in the aftermath (and sometimes even in the anticipation) of their loved ones’ passing that motivate much of the action and narrative development. My dissertation project aims to analyze the intrinsic affective qualities of “Genji monogatari’s” portrayals of death and mourning. Although the text showcases Murasaki Shikibu’s skillful interweaving of Heian spiritual beliefs, social rituals, and funerary practices with classical literary tropes and the preexisting traditions in elegiac poetry, it also represents a significant departure and innovation vis-à-vis earlier and contemporary depictions of death. For one, it resurrects and reinvents the depiction of the corpse which all but disappeared from courtly literature, and expands the narrated experience of bereavement from the point of view of an isolated principal mourner to that of a larger emotional/affective community. What’s more, the narrative patterns and images it establishes early on continue to evolve over the span of the text itself. The “Genji’s” hallmark death scenes foreground the exquisite bodies of the dying or already dead—and almost exclusively female—subjects, laid out unobstructed to the discerning gaze of the male protagonists. As I will show through a thorough exploration of the poetic vocabulary and affective narrative structuring in situations dealing with grief and sorrow in these scenes, this has the effect of narratively minimizing the moment of death as a descriptive event and instead heralding an affective mode of storytelling that creates communal bonds between the bereaved characters, the narrator(s), and the readers. That said, as the plot progresses, subtle subversive changes start to emerge: the women in the first part of the tale, who remained beautiful but voiceless after frequently meeting sudden ends, give way to characters who anticipate and eventually even will their demise, and whose richer interiority offers insights on their mortality that can counterpoint the ensuing objectifying consumption of their bodies. This development consequently not only brings into question the larger meaning of death retrospectively throughout the entire text, but also allows us to glean Murasaki Shikibu’s own intratextual theorization on the affective and narrative functions of death, in addition to its wider literary potential.

Yes / Theories of Continuing Bonds, and more recently, the Dual Process of Grieving, have provided new ways of understanding the bereavement process, and have influenced current practice for counsellors, end-oflife care practitioners and other professionals. This paper uses these theories in a new way, exploring their relevance to archaeological interpretation, with particular reference to the phenomenon of the plastering of skulls of the deceased in the Neolithic of Southwest Asia (the Middle East/Near East), suggesting that traditional archaeological interpretations, which focus on concepts of status and social organisation, may be missing a more basic reaction to grief and a desire to keep the dead close for longer.

This study investigated the process of bereavement in the Xhosa, Zulu and Tswana cultures with participants including three cultural experts and a bereaved family from each ethnic group. Data was collected using semi – structured interviews mainly in the participants’ homes. Analysis was used by comparing and contrasting the information gathered. Empirical research findings revealed that the process in the African culture specifically in these three ethnic groups is different from the western culture as stated in the literature. The literature review findings show that the western culture’s processes of bereavement seem focused in the intrapersonal processes. However, the African Black cultures seem to be focused more on interpersonal processes of bereavement. Recommendations are made in the study on how a western trained Educational Psychologist can approach a bereaved client coming from these ethnic groups. Recommendations are also made for Educators and Parents. / Educational Studies / M. Ed. (Guidance and Counselling)

Text in Afrikaans / Summaries in English and Afrikaans / Die dood van 'n ouer he! 'n effek op die totale lewe van die kind en dompel die kind in emosionele nood wat terapeutiese begeleiding noodsaak. Na afloop van die afsterwe van 'n ouer, vind daar fisieke, emosionele, sosiale en kognitiewe veranderinge in die kind se lewe plaas waarop hy nie voorbereid is nie, en wat hy ook nie verstaan nie. Hierdie veranderinge veroorsaak dat die kind se leefwereld in so mate verander dat sy funksionering benadeel word. Daar is met hierdie studie gepoog om vas te stel watter effek die dood van 'n ouer op die kind he! en tot watter mate terapeutiese begeleiding die kind se emosionele nood kan verlig. Daar is in die studie gevind dat rou inderdaad 'n gekompliseerde proses is wat lei tot die ontstaan van talle onbeantwoorde vrae, gevoelens van magteloosheid en emosionele pyn. Kinders wat in rousmart verkeer word dikwels deur die samelewing misgekyk en kry as gevolg hiervan nie voldoende hulp nie. Di! lei tot die ontstaan van persoonlikheidsontwikkelingsprobleme, relasionele probleme en intra-psigiese probleme soos 'n swak selfbeeld, ego-verdedigingsmeganismes, persoonlike kwesbaarheid, ongunstige betekenisgewing en ongunstige belewenisse. Hierdie probleme veroorsaak dat die kind in sy selfaktualisering gerem word en as gevolg hiervan nie sy gegewe moontlikhede verwerklik nie. Die studie het verder bewys dat die kind wat 'n ouer aan die dood afgestaan het, wel deur middel van terapeutiese begeleiding deur 'n sielkundige gehelp kan word om die verlies van 'n ouer in so 'n mate te hanteer dat die faktore wat die kind se selfaktualisering rem, opgehef kan word. Die studie voorsien die sielkundige van riglyne ten opsigte van die proses van terapeutiese begeleiding aan die kind wat 'n ouer aan die dood afgestaan het. Riglyne word gebied ten opsigte van die hantering van die kind se onmiddellike situasie, die evaluasie van die kind-inrousmart, die vasstelling van doelstellings en doelwitte vir terapeutiese begeleiding, die selektering van terapeutiese tegnieke, die terapeutiese hulpverlening aan die kind, die hulpverlening aan die oorblywende ouer en die hulpverlening aan die onderwyser wat gemoeid is met die kind-in-rousmart. Riglyne word ook gebied ten opsigte van die terminering van terapie. / The death if a parent has an influence on the total life of a child and causes emotional trauma that necessitates therapeutic guidance. After the death of a parent, physical, emotional, social and cognitive changes occur in the child's life for which he is not prepared and that he also does not understand. These factors cause such a change in the child's life-world that his functioning is hampered. In this study it was endeavoured to determine what effect the death of a parent has on a child's life and to what extent therapeutic guidance can alleviate the child's emotional trauma. In this study it was found that mourning is indeed a complicated process that gives rise to countless unanswered questions, feelings of helplessness and emotional pain. Children suffering grief in mourning are often ignored by society and as result of this, they do not receive adequate assistance. This leads to problems concerned with the development of the personality, relational problems and intrapsychological problems such as a poor self-concept, ego defence mechanisms, personal vulnerability, negative ways of acquiring meaning and unfavourable ways of experiencing life. These problems give rise to the hampering of the child's selfactualisation and because of this he cannot realise his potential. The study has furthermore proved that the child who has lost a parent through death, can be helped by a psychologist. This can be done by means of therapeutic guidance so that the child can handle the loss of a parent to such an extent that the factors that hamper his self-actualisation can be removed. The study provides guidelines for therapeutic guidance to the child who has Jost a parent through death. Guidelines are given on handling the child's immediate situation, the evaluation of the child in mourning, the determination of aims and objectives for therapeutic guidance, the selection of therapeutic techniques, therapeutic assistance to the child, assistance to the remaining parent and assistance to the educator who is involved with the child in mourning. Guidelines are also given for the termination of therapy. / Educational Studies / D.Ed (Clinical Psychologist)

This study investigated the process of bereavement in the Xhosa, Zulu and Tswana cultures with participants including three cultural experts and a bereaved family from each ethnic group. Data was collected using semi – structured interviews mainly in the participants’ homes. Analysis was used by comparing and contrasting the information gathered. Empirical research findings revealed that the process in the African culture specifically in these three ethnic groups is different from the western culture as stated in the literature. The literature review findings show that the western culture’s processes of bereavement seem focused in the intrapersonal processes. However, the African Black cultures seem to be focused more on interpersonal processes of bereavement. Recommendations are made in the study on how a western trained Educational Psychologist can approach a bereaved client coming from these ethnic groups. Recommendations are also made for Educators and Parents. / Educational Studies / M. Ed. (Guidance and Counselling)

Text in Afrikaans / Summaries in English and Afrikaans / Die dood van 'n ouer he! 'n effek op die totale lewe van die kind en dompel die kind in emosionele nood wat terapeutiese begeleiding noodsaak. Na afloop van die afsterwe van 'n ouer, vind daar fisieke, emosionele, sosiale en kognitiewe veranderinge in die kind se lewe plaas waarop hy nie voorbereid is nie, en wat hy ook nie verstaan nie. Hierdie veranderinge veroorsaak dat die kind se leefwereld in so mate verander dat sy funksionering benadeel word. Daar is met hierdie studie gepoog om vas te stel watter effek die dood van 'n ouer op die kind he! en tot watter mate terapeutiese begeleiding die kind se emosionele nood kan verlig. Daar is in die studie gevind dat rou inderdaad 'n gekompliseerde proses is wat lei tot die ontstaan van talle onbeantwoorde vrae, gevoelens van magteloosheid en emosionele pyn. Kinders wat in rousmart verkeer word dikwels deur die samelewing misgekyk en kry as gevolg hiervan nie voldoende hulp nie. Di! lei tot die ontstaan van persoonlikheidsontwikkelingsprobleme, relasionele probleme en intra-psigiese probleme soos 'n swak selfbeeld, ego-verdedigingsmeganismes, persoonlike kwesbaarheid, ongunstige betekenisgewing en ongunstige belewenisse. Hierdie probleme veroorsaak dat die kind in sy selfaktualisering gerem word en as gevolg hiervan nie sy gegewe moontlikhede verwerklik nie. Die studie het verder bewys dat die kind wat 'n ouer aan die dood afgestaan het, wel deur middel van terapeutiese begeleiding deur 'n sielkundige gehelp kan word om die verlies van 'n ouer in so 'n mate te hanteer dat die faktore wat die kind se selfaktualisering rem, opgehef kan word. Die studie voorsien die sielkundige van riglyne ten opsigte van die proses van terapeutiese begeleiding aan die kind wat 'n ouer aan die dood afgestaan het. Riglyne word gebied ten opsigte van die hantering van die kind se onmiddellike situasie, die evaluasie van die kind-inrousmart, die vasstelling van doelstellings en doelwitte vir terapeutiese begeleiding, die selektering van terapeutiese tegnieke, die terapeutiese hulpverlening aan die kind, die hulpverlening aan die oorblywende ouer en die hulpverlening aan die onderwyser wat gemoeid is met die kind-in-rousmart. Riglyne word ook gebied ten opsigte van die terminering van terapie. / The death if a parent has an influence on the total life of a child and causes emotional trauma that necessitates therapeutic guidance. After the death of a parent, physical, emotional, social and cognitive changes occur in the child's life for which he is not prepared and that he also does not understand. These factors cause such a change in the child's life-world that his functioning is hampered. In this study it was endeavoured to determine what effect the death of a parent has on a child's life and to what extent therapeutic guidance can alleviate the child's emotional trauma. In this study it was found that mourning is indeed a complicated process that gives rise to countless unanswered questions, feelings of helplessness and emotional pain. Children suffering grief in mourning are often ignored by society and as result of this, they do not receive adequate assistance. This leads to problems concerned with the development of the personality, relational problems and intrapsychological problems such as a poor self-concept, ego defence mechanisms, personal vulnerability, negative ways of acquiring meaning and unfavourable ways of experiencing life. These problems give rise to the hampering of the child's selfactualisation and because of this he cannot realise his potential. The study has furthermore proved that the child who has lost a parent through death, can be helped by a psychologist. This can be done by means of therapeutic guidance so that the child can handle the loss of a parent to such an extent that the factors that hamper his self-actualisation can be removed. The study provides guidelines for therapeutic guidance to the child who has Jost a parent through death. Guidelines are given on handling the child's immediate situation, the evaluation of the child in mourning, the determination of aims and objectives for therapeutic guidance, the selection of therapeutic techniques, therapeutic assistance to the child, assistance to the remaining parent and assistance to the educator who is involved with the child in mourning. Guidelines are also given for the termination of therapy. / Educational Studies / D.Ed (Clinical Psychologist)

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