Encountering Corpses

Encountering Corpses is an event series that has operated out of Manchester Metropolitan University since 2014. During that time it has delivered public events in Manchester Museum, (including meeting the ‘Manchester Mummies’ of the Egyptology collection), plus events at Manchester Crematorium and in All Saints Park (a former graveyard). Encountering Corpses is about the many ways in which we increasingly interact with the material remains of the dead in contemporary society. It looks at how dead bodies play a variety of roles in diverse social, cultural, economic and political processes. As death perhaps becomes less of a taboo in “Western” societies – it also seeks to ask questions like: are the dead becoming more visible in everyday life? If so, what role do they play in processes as diverse as identity formation, nation building, media, protest, memory, remembrance and commemoration, celebrity and fandom, economies of death, trade in body parts, sexual orientation, belief systems and tourism?

Encountering Corpses is led by Craig Young, Professor in Human Geography at Manchester Metropolitan University.

@EncounterManMet