Overview of Course

Death and grief are universal experiences, yet attitudes and practices vary across culture and history. We will examine these various practices as we visit different ports. Through a combination of both lecture and engaging class discussion, you will gain useful knowledge related to the medical and legal issues associated with dying, and models for supporting dying individuals and their family members. You will also learn what to do and say to support grieving children, adolescents, and adults. We will explore a variety of losses, including non-death losses associated with change and transition, anticipated and sudden deaths, and the deaths of both humans and pets. We will also discuss strategies for coping with death anxiety, a common concern for students. Some students who take this class will have had significant losses themselves, whereas others will have had only minimal experiences with death. Some students will take this class for personal reasons or interests, and others are in pursuit of professional goals in fields such as health care and other helping professions, education, criminology and legal services, or the funeral industry. If you are taking this class for personal reasons, please keep in mind that while it might help you, it does not substitute for therapy and is an academic class with exams and graded assignments.