Tony Walter

Biography

I was a freelance writer for many years, before becoming Lecturer, then Reader, in Sociology at the University of Reading 1994-2007. In the mid-1980s, I wrote three books on unemployment and social security, but over the past twenty years I have focused on researching, writing and lecturing on death in modern society, e.g. funerals, afterlife beliefs, personal bereavement and public mourning, human remains in museums, new discourses of spirituality, death in the news media and in online social media.

Research Interest

Research interests Bereavement Social relationships between the living and the dead Informal social networks (online and offline) at the end of life Projects Bereavement following substance use How and why different societies manage death differently Angels and bereavement