We all have ideas about death and dying. We all have questions about it. Is it “an end”, “a beginning”, “a transition”, “nothing”, or “something”? Our list can go on. In many ways, death and dying are ineffable, are inexorably related to our existence. Yet, death also has social dimensions that often go unrecognized. Over the past several years, I have had the several opportunity to teach a course at SUNY New Paltz, titled “Death and American Society”. It is in that course that many of the ideas that are to be presented here had a chance to develop.

Sociology has significantly contributed to our understanding of death and dying, and is now an integral component of thanatology. It offers insight into everyday life in terms of institutions and organizations. Issues related to end-of-life care, ritual and belief, and the funerary industries have all benefited from sociological study. Just as important, death and dying is built into our contemporary social existence and sociological thought has teased this out. From Georg Simmel to Zygmunt Bauman, how death is folded into social life, how we come to understand “living” with the knowledge of death, and how “being” is shaped by death are all questions raised by this line of inquiry.