UWA Institute for Advanced Studies Public Lecture: The Archaeology of Death and Pandemics

Ouzman, S. (Speaker)

Activity: Service and engagement › Public lecture, debate or seminar

Description

Death is a key moment and process in human life. People often invest a great deal of thought and emotion in how they adjust their relationship with once-living people, things and places. Indeed, how we define and dispose of the dead is one of the attributes that makes us ‘human’.

But how does a study of death work during a global pandemic, when death is anything but academic? In order to address key questions such as 'what is death?' (and did you know Western Australian legislation does NOT have a definition of ‘death’?), we need to understand pandemics in global and archaeological perspectives, back to the first recorded pandemic the Justinian Plague of 521 CE. We also need to consider at the ‘downtrodden dead’ – children, women, Neanderthals and ‘deviant’ burials and how pandemics variably affect these categories of people. For example, most people unaware of the lethality of imported pathogens to Indigenous people, with up to 90% of some populations decimated.

But Archaeology is not just a study of the past – it places the present in context (in the next 100 years we have to dispose of over 7 billion people) – and helps us map the future of our death behaviours (from alkaline hydrolysis to integrating human ashes to coral reefs or making them in to diamonds, pencils or shooting capsules of cremated remains into space). This talk concludes by arguing that the lasting social, religious and economic impacts on how we understand and treat death is entering a new chapter as COVID and related deaths reconfigure our future necroscapes.

Dr Sven Ouzman is an archaeologist and heritage specialists at UWA’s School of Social Sciences. He researches the Indigenous rock arts and archaeology in northern Australia and southern Africa. Around Perth he investigates issues of homelessness and graffiti. He is Director of learning, Teaching and Student Matters for UWA Social sciences and co-ordinates the Archaeology Major in which he teaches ARCY2006 The Archaeology of Death.

Warning: This lecture contains images and sometimes names of dead people, and examines issues that can be distressing. Counselling is available for staff and students:

Period	10 Aug 2021
Event title	UWA Institute for Advanced Studies Public Lecture: The Archaeology of Death and Pandemics
Event type	Community
Location	Crawley, Australia, Western AustraliaShow on map
Degree of Recognition	Regional

Keywords

Archaeology
Death
Pandemic
Epidemic

Documents & Links

Death is a key moment and process in human life. People often invest a great deal of thought and emotion in how they adjust their relationship with once-living people, things and places. Indeed, how we define and dispose of the dead is one of the attributes that makes us ‘human’. But how does a study of death work during a global pandemic, when death is anything but academic? In order to address key questions such as 'what is death?' (and did you know Western Australian legislation does NOT have a definition of ‘death’?), we need to understand pandemics in global and archaeological perspectives, back to the first recorded pandemic the Justinian Plague of 521 CE. We also need to consider at the ‘downtrodden dead’ – children, women, Neanderthals and ‘deviant’ burials and how pandemics variably affect these categories of people. For example, most people unaware of the lethality of imported pathogens to Indigenous people, with up to 90% of some populations decimated. But Archaeology is not just a study of the past – it places the present in context (in the next 100 years we have to dispose of over 7 billion people) – and helps us map the future of our death behaviours (from alkaline hydrolysis to integrating human ashes to coral reefs or making them in to diamonds, pencils or shooting capsules of cremated remains into space). This talk concludes by arguing that the lasting social, religious and economic impacts on how we understand and treat death is entering a new chapter as COVID and related deaths reconfigure our future necroscapes. Dr Sven Ouzman is an archaeologist and heritage specialists at UWA’s School of Social Sciences. He researches the Indigenous rock arts and archaeology in northern Australia and southern Africa. Around Perth he investigates issues of homelessness and graffiti. He is Director of learning, Teaching and Student Matters for UWA Social sciences and co-ordinates the Archaeology Major in which he teaches ARCY2006 The Archaeology of Death. Warning: This lecture contains images and sometimes names of dead people, and examines issues that can be distressing. Counselling is available for staff and students: Counselling and Psychological Services Employee Assistance Program Or for the general public here: Head to Health