Transmortale – New Research on Death

About the Transmortality

Organized by the working group transmortality X of the Museum for Sepulchral Culture and the University of Hamburg.

transmortality

New Research on Death

The topics of dying, death and mourning have increasingly become the focus of interdisciplinary research in recent years. Disciplines such as archaeology, ethnology or art history have always been concerned with graves and burial places. In the meantime, however, very different disciplines are interested in the change of mourning and burial culture, such as sociology, psychology, but also history and health sciences, cultural studies, gender studies and media studies.

Under the title transmortality, a workshop was held for the first time on February 6, 2010 at the University of Hamburg in order to link the many-sided and multi-layered research approaches to the topic of dying, death and mourning. The events transmortality II to IX have taken place in an expanded framework as a conference and workshop at the Museum for Sepulchral Culture in Kassel.

In 2017, there was an international conference in Luxembourg with Transmortality International, organized by the Research Project: Material Culture and Spaces of Remembrance. The transmortale is open to young scholars from the field of early career research (students in the final phase or PhD students), but also to postdocs and interested researchers.

Here the programs and proceedings of previous transmortale events can be viewed. A selection of contributions was published in: Moritz Buchner und Anna-Maria Götz (Hrsg.): transmortale. Sterben, Tod und Trauer in der neueren Forschung (Kasseler Studien zur Sepulkralkultur Band 22), Köln: Böhlau, 2016. The volume brings together a selection of transmortale-contributions from different disciplines such as history, art history, ethnology, cultural anthropology, sociology, theatre, film and music studies as well as cultural and media studies.

Publication

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Transmortality XII

Death is known to be a problem of the living. Thus, all scientific fields of research that deal with the (co)existence of human beings also have points of contact with dying and death, farewells and commemoration, finitude and attempts to cope with the inevitable.

2010 was the beginning of the transmortality, which has been held annually since then. This year, the first day of the event is thematically open to young scientists who are in the final stages of writing a qualification thesis, but also to postdocs and other interested researchers. The goal is an interdisciplinary discussion that brings together empirical as well as theoretical approaches and opens up an intensive exchange.

On the second day – thematically in line with the upcoming special exhibition – the specific topic of "comfort" will be examined from a transdisciplinary perspective by junior and by experienced scholars. Consolation is a ritualized form of interaction that is closely connected to death and mourning contexts, but also becomes virulent in other experiences of disappointment or loss. Consolation does not change existing problems, but the corresponding social gestures symbolize that the suffered cut does not have to be coped with alone. Comforting invites reflection on what has happened without numbing the pain of loss.

Programme Friday, March 24, 2023 | 11:00 am – 6:30 pm

Each presentation will be followed by a discussion (not at the poster sessions)

11:00 – 11:15 am
Welcome

Panel 1

11:15 – 11:45 am
Daniel Felscher (Frankfurt (Oder))
„Und in der Stille, da wird es so richtig intensiv.“ Reduktion und Intensivierung in Praktiken der Stille am Beispiel ehrenamtlicher Hospizarbeit und Trauerbegleitung

11:45 am – 12:15 pm
Maximiliane Nietzschmann (Heidelberg)
Umgang mit Toten und Sterbenden in Zeiten von Corona (März – April 2020) in der medialen Vermittlung

12:15 – 12:45 pm
Break

Panel 2

12:45 – 13:15 pm
Lena Stange (Oldenburg)
„Also, wenn ich dann tot bin …“ Ergebnisse einer qualitativen Befragung zu gesundheitlicher Vorausplanung für das Lebensende

13:15 – 13:45 pm
Tanja Kilzer (Köln)
Orte des Trostes und der Heilung. Trosträume und tröstende Elemente als essenzieller Bestandteil moderner Gedenkstättengestaltungen und der modernen Gedenkkultur

13:45 – 14:30 pm
Lunch

14:30 – 15:00 pm
Poster-Session

Fanny Berghof / Nina Gurol / Nele Legeland / Clara Schuppan (Regensburg)
Inwieweit sind gesellschaftlich institutionalisierte Sterbe- und Trauerangebote für obdachlose Menschen sinnvoll?

Lena Magdeburg (Paderborn)
Sterben und Tod in den Vorstellungen von Grundschulkindern. Eine qualitative Studie im Kontext von Sachunterrichtsdidaktik

Leonie Schmickler (Passau)
Sterbefasten – Problem oder Lösung? Soziologische Betrachtung eines Sterbehilfediskurses

Panel 3

15:00 – 15:30 pm
Lester Gerdung (Heidelberg)
Die Verschiebung individueller Auseinandersetzung mit Tod und Sterben auf mediale Darstellungen anstelle von gesellschaftlicher Verdrängung

15:30 – 16:00 pm
David Lillington (London, Großbritannien)
Das Thema der Wehklage in der Videokunst von Elisabeth Price

16:00 – 16:30 pm
Break

Panel 4

16:30 – 17:00 pm
Alexander Querengässer (Halle (Saale))
Vom Massengrab zum Nationaldenkmal. Militärische Begräbniskultur vom Mittelalter bis in die Moderne

17:00 – 17:30 pm
Esther Preis (Berlin)
Trost spenden und Trauer normieren. Begräbnisgedichte in der Frühen Neuzeit (1500 – 1700)

18:30 pm
End

Programme Saturday March 25, 2023 | 10:00 am – 17:00 pm

Each presentation will be followed by a discussion (not at the poster sessions)

Panel 1

10:00 – 10:30 am
Katarzyna Woniak (Halle (Saale))
Trost und Todesangst. Emotionen in Polen unter deutscher Besatzung 1939 – 1945

10:30 – 11:00 am
Nina Rabuza (Innsbruck)
Sterben im Kapitalismus. Über Tod und Trauer in der kritischen Gesellschaftstheorie Theodor W. Adornos

11:00 – 11:30 am
Break

Panel 2

11:30 am – 12:00 pm
Matthias Meitzler (Tübingen)
Postmortale Fortexistenz als Trost? Räumliche und körperliche Dimensionen der Verlustbewältigung

12:00 – 12:30 pm
Thorsten Benkel (Passau)
Am Ende. Formen der Beziehungsauflösung

12:30 – 13:30 pm
Lunch

Panel 3

13:30 – 14:00 pm
Melanie Pierburg (Hildesheim)
Die Reflexivität des Leidens. Soziologische Perspektiven auf den Trost

14:00 – 14:30 pm
Ekkehard Coenen (Weimar)
„Es gibt irgendwie so ’ne Trosttruppe.“ Zum Mit-, Für- und Gegeneinander der Gefühlsarbeit im Bestattungswesen

14:30 – 15:00 pm
Break

Panel 4

15:00 – 15:30 pm
Ursula Engelfried-Rave (Koblenz)
Trost suchen und Trost spenden. Eine soziologische Betrachtung des Tröstens

15:30 – 16:00 pm
Miriam Sitter (Hanover)
Trösten oder Vertrösten? Eine zu leistende Differenzierung durch Empathie

17:00 pm
End

Participation fee per day:

Regular: 30,- €
Reduced: 12,50 € (students)

If booked in advance by 20 March 2023, catering (lunch snack, cake, fruit, drinks) can be provided for 27,- € per person per day. Without this, self-catering is required.

Cancellation policy:

If you are unable to attend after registration, please notify us 7 days prior to the start of the conference. Otherwise we will have to charge you the full fee. You have the possibility to name a substitute participant free of charge at any time.

A project by

Study Group Cemetery and Monument (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Friedhof und Denkmal e. V. )
Central Institute and Museum for Sepulchral Culture, Kassel
Dr. Dirk Pörschmann, Dr. Dagmar Kuhle

University of Hamburg
Institute for Empirical Cultural Sciences
Prof. Dr. Norbert Fischer

Cooperation partners in Berlin
Dr. Moritz Buchner, Stephan Hadraschek M.A., Jan S. Möllers M.A.

Working Group Thanatology
Dr. Thorsten Benkel, Passau
Dr. Ekkehard Coenen, Weimar
Prof. Dr. Ursula Engelfried-Rave, Koblenz
Dr. Matthias Hoffmann, Saarbrücken
Matthias Meitzler M.A., Tübingen
Dr. Melanie Pierburg, Hildesheim
Leonie Schmickler B.A., Passau
Dr. Miriam Sitter, Hanover