
Animal Grief Shows We Aren’t Meant to Die Alone
A mother gorilla cradles her dead baby at a zoo in Germany in 2008. Rolf Wilms/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images As the SARS-CoV-2 virus rocks the world, a haunting aspect of…
A mother gorilla cradles her dead baby at a zoo in Germany in 2008. Rolf Wilms/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images As the SARS-CoV-2 virus rocks the world, a haunting aspect of…
Given the recently instigated social distancing rules in Canberra, this week we bring you a special “online” episode! For the safety of everyone, and especially in line with…
While sheltering in place in California during the COVID-19 pandemic, I have been spending a lot of time thinking about my graduation day—but not because it was particularly…
As the novel coronavirus sent China into lockdown, my wife and I started to carefully follow the news. China was far away, and it was hard to imagine…
The author’s first daughter shares time with her great-grandfather Giuseppe, born in 1925 and recently deceased. Daniela Valsecchi Our elders are dying one by one, oak trees struck…
[no-caption] Jonas Androx/Pexels Ask SAPIENS is a series that offers a glimpse into the magazine’s inner workings. Death is an experience that binds all of humanity. Everyone dies.…
The Slavia Field School in Mortuary Archaeology in Drawsko, Poland, unearthed a 400-year-old cemetery. Joanna Pearce Excavating a 17th-century cemetery in the small town of Drawsko, Polan…
Douglas’ theory of matter out of place is about power. Something in the wrong spot, something poisonous, is not matter out of place. Unless it threatens power.
For Raphael Lemkin, who invented the term, genocide was the effort to destroy a group as a group. #MMIWG
A Twitter essay by Mary Annaïse Heglar: Sorry, Y’all, but Climate Change Ain’t the First Existential Threat
A child’s backpack abandoned on a migrant trail in the Tumacácori Mountains suffers the ravages of time. Gabriella Soto “Oh my God. Did you see this backpack?” a…
The Gulf Stream, which curves along the southern shore of Newfoundland, is saturated with plastics. Fish that feed from the surface waters, where plastics tend to accumulate, are…
Conservation biologist Alex Bond on dealing with pollution, harm, and suffering as a scientist.
Scientists have thought about burial—the act of interring a dead body—as a distinctly human behavior. So what happened when a group of paleoanthropologists discovered a primitive hominid that…
For my doctoral research, I interviewed family members living with a loved one with early-onset dementia, a diagnosis that one receives under the age of 65. Jans, not…
Sitting on orange seats in the corridor, Ms Verbeek, her niece Hannie and I are waiting for the general practitioner. Ms Verbeek seems a little restless and is…
Edward the Confessor, one of the last Anglo-Saxon kings of England, died when he was in his early 60s. This illustration depicts the deposition of his body in…
In society, there are many omens associated with impending death. Some may say they had a dream about death while others may associate death with the portrayal of…
What would you do for the perfect selfie? The emergence of the front-facing camera has revolutionized the way we make memories and document our lives. We can’t go…
What is commonly known as the Colombian conflict refers to more than six decades of enduring violence. During these years, a number of peace agreements have been signed…
While avoiding starting my homework, I was watching clips on YouTube from different TLC TV-shows. I quickly fell down the rabbit hole of watching clips from the Untold…
In our society, when someone is on the brink of death it is common for the patient’s loved ones to ask for prayers. We pray for the person…
A couple of months ago, I attended the funeral of a friend. Howard was almost 90 years old when he died, and not only did he live longer…
Comparing my own experiences of death to those of the Tiwi culture that I learned of in my anthropology studies, the void that I felt in the months…