About the Project

About the Project

Care in Funerals Project

The Care in Funerals project was developed because we were concerned about the ways death rites and ceremonies were disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and regulations introduced to manage it. We thought it important to recognise that funerals can be important forms of care and respect, both for people who have died and for their families and friends. We bore that in mind as we considered both the experiences of disruption and new ways of conducting funerals.

The project investigated the experiences of people involved in organising or attending funerals during the COVID-19 pandemic, whether as family and friends, funeral directors and staff, or celebrants or leaders of death rites and ceremonies. We knew that many had experienced difficult and sad situations and conversations, and some had felt a strong sense of unfairness or distress at not being able to do the right thing. Many people, however, had also developed or adopted new ways of organising death rites and funerals, some of which brought advantages, such as enabling people who live far away to take part in ceremonies online.

We are using what we have learned from hearing about these experiences to develop a resource to help policy makers, people involved in funeral service provision, and bereaved families to reflect on what matters about funerals. We want this to help people arrange things accordingly in the future.

A summary of our project findings is now available here. This study was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, as part of UK Research and Innovation’s rapid response to Covid-19. The University of Aberdeen is sponsoring the study. The grant number is ES/V017047/1.

Project Origins

We developed this project from an online ‘Conversation on dying and grieving in the time of COVID-19’ hosted as part of the University of Aberdeen’s ‘Conversations on…’ series in June 2020. Conversations on death and dying

Research Team

Abi Pattenden

As a working funeral director, I have seen first-hand the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on funerals themselves; on bereaved people arranging and participating in them; and on colleagues across the funeral service sector. The effects have been wide-ranging and funerals may change forever as a result. It is very important to me that we learn lessons from this difficult period. I hope that the interviews this project undertakes and the artefacts it explores will enable us to understand how people have responded to the challenges around funerals at such an unprecedented time and that this will lead to outcomes which help stakeholders in future funerals.

Arnar Árnason

I teach in the anthropology department here at the University of Aberdeen, where I have worked for a number of years. Most of my teaching has been on anthropological theory and research methods and on the anthropology of emotion and subjectivity, in addition to general introduction to anthropology. I have been engaged in research on death and grief for a long time and have carried out fieldwork in the North East of England, Japan, Scotland and Iceland. My contribution to this project draws in particular on insights from the anthropology of death and the anthropology of emotion. It is a huge privilege to be working on this important, timely and truly interdisciplinary project.

Ed Thornton (to October 2021)

As an academic studying the history of philosophy, I spend most of my time considering how thinkers from previous generations have attempted to work through some of life’s big questions. I have special interests in the history of 20th century European philosophy, and my aim is to put these ideas into dialogue with present concerns, in order to help us make sense of what’s going on around us. As well as working as a research fellow on the Care in Funerals project, I am also a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen.

Louise Locock

I joined the Health Services Research Unit at Aberdeen in 2017, following 14 years in the Health Experiences Research Group at the University of Oxford, where I was Director of Applied Research. I am a qualitative social science researcher interested in personal experience of health and illness; patient-centred quality improvement and co-design; and patient and family involvement in research and care. A major recent focus of my work has been how we can better use different types of personal experience data to improve care. My interest in this project was partly prompted following the death of a friend very early in the pandemic.

Laura Pusey

My work involves end of life care and guidance, funeral arrangement, and the facilitation of funeral services; also group and individual grief coaching and therapy. Alongside my volunteer work with Cruse, I am the author of two death related workbooks: “My Life’s Tapestry” and “Tapestries of Grief”. Death is universal and all encompassing. My focus is therefore held on the social, emotional, mental, and practical aspects of death and grief that are often overlooked. I work especially within the African and Caribbean communities. My passion lies with the creation of platforms that showcase fellow Death Care Practitioners and service providers of and for the African and Caribbean communities in order to address the vast underrepresentation that currently exists within the funeral industry.

Paolo Maccagno

As an anthropologist I recently joined the Care in Funerals research project, which fits well with my academic and personal interests on end-of-life issues. I am a member of Libera Uscita, an Italian association focused on Right to Die with Dignity and from my home in Scotland I have been promoting open conversations about death for fostering pathways of awareness. My contribution to the project will also come from my ongoing research on the notion of ‘limit’. Restrictions and limitation characterize our current time and in particular the practice of funerals. I am looking forward to drawing on these ideas and experiences as we investigate funerals as caring practices.

Paul Kefford

I am an experienced death practitioner as funeral celebrant and end of life doula, and for some years have been actively engaged with the Centre for Death and Society at the University of Bath. I draw from my long experience as a former civil servant in the Cabinet Office (as well as some years as a volunteer Samaritan listener) to take a reflective approach to my own work, as well as through my offering supervision to other celebrants. I am delighted to have been invited to share my practitioner experience with the project, helping work towards the creation of tools to strengthen emotional resilience of practitioners in and around dying, death and bereavement.

Rebecca Crozier

As an archaeologist specialising in the study of ancient human remains, my research interests ultimately lie with how communities in the past dealt with death. Essentially, I spend my time trying to reconstruct past mortuary practices from the more tangible remains left behind. From Stone Age Orkney, to the Metal Age of the Philippines, I have found that the way humans choose to conduct their funeral rites is hugely varied and complex. I hope to draw on this diversity for this project. I have been at the University of Aberdeen since 2018, where I am a lecturer in archaeology, and programme director for the post-graduate degree in Human Osteoarchaeology.

Vikki Entwistle

Principal Investigator

I’m what some people would call an ‘interdisciplinary’ scholar. I draw on the approaches and learning of several different academic areas in my work. As principal investigator for the Care in Funerals project, I am privileged to be collaborating with colleagues who bring a wonderful diversity of experience, expertise and insight to the team. My research to date has focused largely on quality, ethics and social justice in healthcare and public health provision. I am excited to have this opportunity to help develop thinking about how and why funerals matter to people and what makes for good funeral provision.