The Open Thanatology research group at the Open University are hosting an inaugural one-day conference on campus in Milton Keynes on 16 June, 1.00 PM - 4.30 PM. Open Thanatology is the Open University’s interdisciplinary research group for the study and education of death, dying, loss and grief across the life course. Death, dying and bereavement has been a major research and teaching theme at the Open University for over 20 years. Our research covers theoretical and practice-related dimensions across end of life care and death, including reproductive and neonatal loss, bereavement and memorialisation. Our work is theoretically driven and aims to inform both theory and practice spanning the arts and social sciences, professional practice, caring, and education
The event will include a keynote speech by Dr Libby Sallnow - the first author of the new Lancet Commission on the Value of death: bringing death back into life (2022). Dr Sallnow is a palliative medicine consultant with CNWL NHS Trust in London, UK and an honorary senior lecturer at St Christopher's Hospice and the UCL Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Department, UK. She has helped lead and develop the fields of new public health approaches to end of life care, compassionate communities and social approaches to death, dying and loss over the past two decades in the UK and internationally. Her PhD explored the translation of a model of compassionate communities from Kerala, India to London, UK. She has published over 25 articles and book chapters in these fields and co-edited the book "International perspectives on public health and palliative care" in 2011. She is an Honorary Consultant at the WHO Collaborating Centre for Palliative Care in Kerala, India, Vice President of Public Health Palliative Care International, the President of the Palliative Care Section of the Royal Society of Medicine, UK, and a post-doc researcher at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Belgium
There will also be a short film screening and presentations about Open Thanatology’s work
Refreshments will be provided
Please register now and you will contacted before the event with further information
