IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v66y2008i7p1533-1544.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Dying as a social relationship: A sociological review of debates on the determination of death

Author

Listed:
  • Kellehear, Allan

Abstract

The research literature about 'brain death' is largely characterized by biomedical, bioethical and legal writing. This has led to overlooking wider but no less pertinent social, historical and cultural understandings about death. By ignoring the work of other social and clinical colleagues in the study of dying, the literature on the determination of death has become unnecessarily abstract and socially disconnected from parallel concerns about death and dying. This has led, and continues to lead to, incomplete suggestions and narrow discussions about the nature of death as well as an ongoing misunderstanding of general public and health care staff responses to brain death criteria. This paper provides a sociological outline of these problems through a review of the key literature on the determination of death.

Suggested Citation

  • Kellehear, Allan, 2008. "Dying as a social relationship: A sociological review of debates on the determination of death," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(7), pages 1533-1544, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:66:y:2008:i:7:p:1533-1544
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(07)00681-8
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Giacomini, Mita, 1997. "A change of heart and a change of mind? Technology and the redefinition of death in 1968," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 44(10), pages 1465-1482, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Aita, Kaoruko & Kai, Ichiro, 2010. "Physicians' psychosocial barriers to different modes of withdrawal of life support in critical care: A qualitative study in Japan," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(4), pages 616-622, February.
    2. Ana Patrícia Hilário & Fábio Rafael Augusto, 2022. "Pathways for a ‘Good Death’: Understanding End-of-Life Practices Through An Ethnographic Study in Two Portuguese Palliative Care Units," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 27(2), pages 219-235, June.
    3. Marjaana Seppänen & Mia Niemi & Sofia Sarivaara, 2023. "Social relations and exclusion among people facing death," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 1-9, December.
    4. Teggi, Diana, 2018. "Unexpected death in ill old age: An analysis of disadvantaged dying in the English old population," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 217(C), pages 112-120.
    5. Omer Canpolat & Hatice Yaprak Civelek, 2022. "Context of Mourning During the Pandemic: Spaces, Rituals, Outgoings, and Survivors," Journal of Economy Culture and Society, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 65(65), pages 81-104, June.
    6. van Beinum, Amanda & Hornby, Laura & Scales, Nathan & Shemie, Sam D. & Dhanani, Sonny, 2022. "Autoresuscitation and clinical authority in death determination using circulatory criteria," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 301(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nettleton, Sarah & Kitzinger, Jenny & Kitzinger, Celia, 2014. "A diagnostic illusory? The case of distinguishing between “vegetative” and “minimally conscious” states," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 134-141.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:66:y:2008:i:7:p:1533-1544. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.