“What’s said and done in the mortuary stays in the mortuary”: secrecy and (in)visibility of the dead and data collection in South Australia

ABSTRACT

This paper draws on original ethnographic research in Australia focussing on the handling, management, and conceptualisation of death and the dead human body in 2020–2021. Analysis produced themes of secrecy and (in)visibility regarding both death and the collection of data. Key findings discussed are the withdrawal of information and off-the-record comments from participants, controlling of public access to information, and the (in)visibility of death and the body in the context of the mortuary, viewings and identifications, and the presentation of the body in virtual spaces. The paper argues that those who work with death and the dead in this particular context have power to shield their work, the body, and their processes from the public. Future research exploring the attitudes held by the general public towards death and the body and whether they align or challenge the death industry is proposed.

KEYWORDS:

• Death
• body
• visibility
• secrecy
• anthropology

Introduction

It takes an elevator ride, multiple key-carded doors, and a labyrinth of staff-only corridors for Caelus¹ and I to arrive at the mortuary entrance. Leading up to this moment I envisioned what I might see behind the heavy double doors. Will Caelus show me death and the body up close – something I have been aiming to see since the start of my research? Holding my breath, the doors slowly swing open and we step inside. ‘It’s got better lighting than you’ve seen on TV … not like on CSI’ Caelus laughs as he leads me around the mortuary. He is right; unlike the shadowy mortuaries depicted on the television show, white bright lights illuminate the theatre space and reflect off the cold metal surfaces. This room is used for post-mortems, but the dead body is nowhere to be seen. There are, however, subtle reminders that at some point, somebody was here. Following Caelus around the middle table, I look to my feet as I narrowly avoid stepping into a small water puddle that has gathered around the flushing drain. My eyes then wander up to the empty table where something catches my attention. Tangled within the table drain is a long hair. Going back into the long hallway we eventually stop in front of a large sliding door. The cool room. ‘Um I don’t know if you’re happy to look? It’s just blue bags’. After I nod, Caelus ushers me into the enclosed space and he slides the door shut behind us. Tucked away within the steel racks are three formless body bags. There is no denying that death is here; the body, though, remains concealed and inaccessible to me.

Death and the dead body have been understood in the social science literature as variously provocative of anxiety (Becker, 1973; Lehto & Stein, 2009; Menzies et al., 2018), historically shifting from being a public event to mainly being private, forbidden, and taboo in early modern times within a western cultural context (Ariès, 1974; Arora, 2021; Gorer, 1955; Kearl, 1989; Kellehear, 2007). Particularly in postmodern times, death and the body are becoming a spectacle; something that ‘we witness at a safe distance but hardly ever experience upfront’ (Arora, 2021; Jacobsen, 2016, p. 10). This can lead to morbid curiosity of death and cause of death (Scrivner, 2021), seeking out death-related stimuli such as media, news, death footage, and imagery (Malkowski, 2017; Oosterwijk, 2017), creating videos for educational and/or entertainment purposes, and partaking in dark tourism which involves attending attractions or events connected to ‘death, suffering, violence or disaster’ (Stone & Sharpley, 2008, p. 574). However, death, and in particular the dead body, are rarely truly experienced ‘upfront’ and in close physical proximity as they are predominantly hidden away and inaccessible due to factors such as sequestration, and the institutionalisation, medicalisation, professionalisation, and secularisation of dying, death and the death industry (Clark, 2002; Fratini et al., 2022; Howarth, 2007; Mellor & Shilling, 1993; Swerissen & Duckett, 2015; Walter, 1996). As demonstrated in the vignette above from the first author’s research in Adelaide, Australia, in 2020, the ability to openly see and discuss the processes to which dead bodies are subjected to is carefully controlled. To the first author, the experience of encountering the singular strand of hair in the mortuary sink and viewing the body bags in the cool room indicated ‘the possibility of a second world alongside the obvious world’; a glimpse into the realities and innerworkings of death and the dead which is not usually intended to be seen unless carefully staged and managed (Simmel, 1906, p. 462).

In this paper, following a discussion of methodology, we discuss three key findings drawn from ethnographic data which indicate that access to and visibility of the dead body is usually kept hidden, secret, or is carefully curated. Firstly, we discuss withdrawal and redaction of information and off-the-record comments the first author experienced during the interview stage of the research and how this could be attributed to retrospective abjection or secrecy. Secondly, we explore the controlling of public access to information. In particular, we identify what is typically not accessible and the potential reasons why this approach has been undertaken such as death anxiety and protecting the bereaved and public from the realities of death. Finally, we discuss the contradictions of the partial or curated visibility of death and the body in the context of mortuary space, viewings and identifications, and invisibility of the dead presented in virtual spaces through relevant websites and mass media. As evidenced across all the findings, and despite efforts to broaden access, knowledge and education, it appears that secrecy shaped access to death and data. Based on our findings, we highlight an area for future research exploring what attitudes the general public and bereaved hold towards current access and (in)visibility of death and the body. Throughout our paper, we interchangeably use the phrases ‘the dead’, ‘the dead body’ and ‘the deceased’. These phrases have been guided by participant responses who would tend to refer to dead people in their care as ‘deceased’ and ‘the dead’ and ‘the body’ as general terms.

Methods and data

Approach

The methodological approach and processes for this research project have been outlined previously (Fratini et al., 2022). For context, this paper is part of the first author’s PhD which is a supervised, cross-disciplinary study exploring death and the dead body in contemporary Adelaide, South Australia. Grounded in the fields of anthropology and psychology, it is based on an ethnographic study conducted between February 2020 and July 2021. As per the characteristics of a patchwork ethnography (Günel et al., 2020), the first author utilised a combination of methods, approaches, and tools. This involved expanding the core field site of the first author’s hometown with online and offline sites, conducting research from her house, physical visits to relevant field sites such as local funeral homes and a hospital mortuary, virtual visits to local funeral home websites, utilising multi-media resources including the social media app TikTok, documentaries, news stories and relevant websites pertaining to death and the body, relevant South Australian legislation, and joining relevant scholarly bodies (Fratini et al., 2022). Recruiting and facilitating interviews with participants in-person, over the phone, online via Zoom, and through email provided important data for the research.

Participants

Eighty-eight potential participants were sourced and contacted through publicly available email addresses. From this, 22 participants agreed to participate in this research project and were interviewed. However, after reviewing their transcript, one participant withdrew their consent to participate, which brought the final number of active participants to 21. There were difficulties in accessing the field and, in turn, finding willing participants, so snowball sampling was used which was fruitful in recruiting participants. All participants were or had been employed in positions that involve death and the dead. These positions included sectors directly linked to the death industry such as cemetery workers, crematorium operators, death doulas, embalmers, funeral directors, memorial consultants, mortuary technicians, and photographers. Additional roles which handle, manage and discuss death and the dead body within their occupation included academics, law enforcement officers, medical staff, and pathologists. Note that all participants quoted in this paper have been assigned a pseudonym.

Data collection

The first author utilised in-depth, semi-structured interviews based on the circumstances of the various field sites in order to understand how the dead body is conceptualised, handled, and processed, and the reasons behind these choices. As outlined by Fratini et al. (2022, p. 6), the first author created an interview guide comprising two sections wherein the first section consisted of abstract body-based questions to see how the participant conceptualised death and the body. The second section of the interview involved questions directly related to their occupation to explore the participants’ roles (past and present), and the methods and processes they use with the dead. Nineteen interviews were recorded and later transcribed verbatim by the first author. Where consent was not given for the interview to be recorded, hand written notes were taken, as agreed upon on the consent form. In conjunction with interviews, data were also collected through engaging with the multi-modal resources mentioned as detailed above, such as, for example, examination of relevant websites.

Data analysis

With supervisory support from the second and third authors, thematic analysis of the interview data with an inductive approach was undertaken and achieved through the use of a thematic codex made by the first author in Excel. This accessible and flexible style of analysis was chosen to uncover patterns, differences, and themes within the participants’ responses (Braun & Clarke, 2006, 2022; Nowell et al., 2017). In essence, it was deemed best suited for ‘providing a rich and detailed, yet complex account of data’ (Nowell et al., 2017, p. 2). An inductive approach was also utilised so that the analysis would be guided and ‘driven’ by the data of the transcripts as opposed to the preconceptions of the first author or trying to fit the data into a pre-existing frame (Braun & Clarke, 2006, p. 83). This type of analysis was also extended to the multi-modal resources researched. As we highlight in this paper, what was not heard, seen, or later redacted was also an important focus of analysis.

Ethical considerations

Ethics approval was granted from the Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) at the university where the first author is a PhD student and the subsequent authors are employed. All potential participants received an information sheet and consent form. The information sheet provided details of the study and invited participants to an interview with the first author. Proactive measures were taken to ensure participants were aware of how the data (namely transcripts) would and could be used and deidentified. This was outlined in the information sheet and discussed during interviews, email correspondence, and follow-up phone calls during transcript reviews. The reviewing procedure which offered participants the opportunity to view their deidentified transcript for validation, to add or delete material, or withdraw their consent up until the commencement of the writing of the thesis in 2021 was outlined.

Withdrawal of information from the researcher

During the interview stage of the ethnography, participants shared numerous things about death and the dead body. In many instances, the first author was struck by participants’ candidness as they went into detail about body handling and management processes which she had never heard before. Through their words, verbal access was provided and an image of what could potentially happen behind the closed doors of the mortuary was offered. However, when participants reviewed their transcripts, three decided to redact portions of their responses, and one participant withdrew their consent to participate in the research project altogether. While this led to a small portion of data lost relative to the overall data corpus and did not materially alter the data, in other cases, the magnitude of changes and redactions was such that important and novel information was unusable. Additionally, two participants chose to not have their interviews audio recorded so it is likely that specific terms or longer quotes were also lost.

Most reasons for participants’ redactions are clear through their comments. Participants voiced concern that despite being assigned a pseudonym, they feared being identified through deductive disclosure (Kaiser, 2009). They thought that because the death industry in Adelaide is small, particular bodies, causes of deaths, or methods they worked with could potentially trace them back to specific businesses despite names being redacted, or not being used in the first place. In conjunction, participants also thought that what they were sharing could ‘violate’ clients (namely, the deceased and their families) and the companies for which they worked. As a consequence of this, a handful of participants were worried about the prospect of being ‘found out’ or sued by past and present employers and either redacted responses or asked for specific details such as the age of the deceased or cause of death to be changed. Particular participants’ roles and professional codes of conduct may have influenced their choice to redact, withdraw information, or not have their interviews recorded. This may be the case for the five out of the six participants mentioned here who were and are affiliated with the commercial side of the death industry such as funeral directing and cemetery services. As mentioned by one participant who worked in this field, confidentiality agreements are usually a requirement of employment.

Participants also noted that they felt that some of their responses were ‘information overloaded’ or could be too explicit to share which resulted in redactions and changes. There was a clear theme of what constituted ‘explicit’ material. This was usually related to topics directly linked to the dead body and pertained to methods and instruments used to wash and prepare the body, highly sensory descriptions of various decomposition processes, bodily fluids, and states of the body influenced by cause of death. Expressions and exclamations relating to disgust and in some instances, laughter tended to accompany some of these descriptions. For these participants, ‘explicitness’ can closely be linked to the abject (Kristeva, 1982). As widely cited, Kristeva states that it is ‘not cleanliness or health that causes abjection but what disturbs identity, system, and order. What does not respect borders, positions, rules. The in-between, the ambiguous, the composite’ (Kristeva, 1982, p. 4). The body, which was once familiar or ‘held sacred’ within societal, cultural, personal and symbolic standards or order, becomes challenged, defiled and potentially dangerous once dead (Kristeva, 1982; Rudge, 2015; Sørensen, 2009). Both metaphorically and literally breaching its boundaries, the abject body and, in turn, its by-products and associated actions performed on the dead body sit outside the standards and orders. Therefore, as a psychological defence mechanism and a way to attempt to restore order, one may react with abjection: rejection, repugnance, horror, anxiety, intrigue, and sometimes as a way to (dis)place the abjection, laughter towards the abject (Kristeva, 1982; Rizq, 2013; Rudge, 2015; Sørensen, 2009). Arguably, through the reactions and responses from the participants, some may have experienced abjection when reviewing their transcripts and thus decided to redact and deem the content too explicit, or in this case, abject, to share with those outside of the death industry.

While retrospective abjection to their responses may be one viable explanation behind participant redactions, it may also be attributed to secrecy. Generally, ‘secrecy’ relates to the various processes, conditions and methods used in the keeping of secrets such as intentional concealment and hiding, whereas the content of a secret can be virtually anything (Bok, 1984; Grey & Costas, 2016). Based on this, secrecy and secrets have the ability to shift and change between states of known, unknown, revealed and concealed. However, this is highly dependent on the conditions, circumstances, and contexts they reside in which highlights the importance – and difficulties – of being able to study them where possible (Birchall, 2016). At a foundational level, Georg Simmel’s (1906) well-cited sociological analysis of secrecy and secret societies explored the function, form, significance, and influence secrets can hold within societal contexts and relationships. What can be garnered from Simmel’s work is that secrecy, regardless of its contents, and whether a secret actually exists, is a sociological phenomenon which can modify relationships and interactions with others. Secrecy can possess both inclusionary and exclusionary functions; which ‘sets barriers … but at the same time offers the seductive temptation to break through the barriers by gossip or confession’ (Simmel, 1906, p. 466).

When the first author interviewed Iris, they discussed the difficulty of trying to gain access to the death industry and in particular, the funeral industry for research purposes and why this might be the case. During this discussion, Iris mentioned ‘it’s always been sort of shrouded in mystery, you know “undertaker’s secrets” so to speak … and I can understand that still may be present’. Following Simmel’s work, the content of what is kept secret is less important than the social relations of secrecy. Those of us outside the death industry are often excluded from knowing, and even if we know some material, we are not allowed to use or pass on this material.

Off-the-record comments

During the first author’s interviews, many participants shared highly relevant and insightful data including information, narratives and images pertaining to their work and experiences, but they did not want it recorded or discussed elsewhere. This typically occurred post-interview when the recorder was turned off, or during the interview and was clearly bordered with comments such as ‘as an aside’ and ‘strictly off-the-record’. While the exact contents of the data cannot be discussed, its occurrence it is still a form of communication which comes with a set of ethical considerations for the qualitative researcher in relation to how they can, or whether they should manage and explore this information (Belcher & Martin, 2019; Dimitrov, 2020). In conjunction with participant redactions, off-the-record comments also pose a thought-provoking question: why did not the participants simply choose to remain silent and not share the information in the first place, both on and off-the-record? Fear that their comments may stigmatise them or be misconstrued could be a potential reason (Warren et al., 2003). Apollo encapsulated this notion on-record, while he reflected on who would know about what he had said during their interview:

I was just thinking as I was saying this ‘hmm … I wonder if this is classified … ’ you know? Umm … because some of it can be of a sensitive nature, umm a lot of people umm perhaps are not as open as you are towards me and what I am towards you, umm … and they could see it as a bit yuck … umm or maybe inferring, you know, all those sorts of things. But … I’m honest with you because I’ve got nothing to hide.

Apollo’s comment also echoes that participants may also share the same dilemma that the researcher experiences. Similar to the researcher who has been trusted with a ‘gift’ of off-the-record and redacted information which now binds them in obligation to choose how this information is managed (Belcher & Martin, 2019, p. 38), the participants have also been gifted this information through their work and may be bound to contractual obligations that can hinder their ability to share fully. Therefore, participants must also choose whether it is divulged and the manner in which it is expressed; be it on-the-record, off-the-record, or redacted later. This leads to the second question: if they only shared things that they thought were acceptable at the time of the interview, does this mean there is other material to which the authors will remain not privy to because participants felt it was not appropriate to talk about at all and thus remained silent? While we cannot know for certain, we suspect that the answer is likely yes.

Controlling public access to information

Another theme which arose from the data was the need for those who work with the dead to protect or shield various stakeholders involved in the death processes. Based on the data, this protection reaches out beyond withdrawing information from the research project; it may also extend to withdrawing various information and access from the public as well. This can be done for legal reasons; particularly when deaths are sudden, suspicious, due to road trauma, or a coronial inquest may be required. In these instances, attending police officers act under the power of the corner and in turn, the Coroners Act 2003 (SA) which allows them to control public access to death and the body. This may include not divulging information about the deceased and their death, procedures being performed, and having the ability to conceal or cordon off the area where the dead body is located. It was also apparent that great care is taken to ensure the bereaved and members of public are not fully told or shown the realities of death and the processes that a body goes through. This notion was echoed by several participants who work in different sectors in the death industry where the public are not told (or shown) certain processes, to presumably avoid causing disgust, terror, distress, or confrontation with death. Veritas viewed it from the perspective that privacy in her work, particularly about what occurs behind the scenes, was important to avoid negative reactions: ‘there’s a lot of things I guess that go on that if you knew you’d just [laughs] umm turn your toes up’. Conversely, providing limited information to others was tacit knowledge in Minerva’s role: ‘I do believe there is a code of ethics … unspoken of … you only say a certain amount, and it’s not because anybody does anything wrong, it’s just a confronting topic’. Further, Luna discussed the precautions taken in her role to ensure ‘the family or loved ones don’t see the undignified parts’; such as ensuring they are not present when the body is examined or moved.

Legislatively, the Burial and Cremation Act 2013 (SA) requires that ‘human remains be treated at all times with dignity and respect’ (part 1, section 6, p. 7) which may also influence or control public access to the dead body and information relating to procedures. This regulation is reflected in many relevant codes of ethics and practices, such as the Australian Funeral Directors Association (AFDA, 2023), the Independent Funeral Directors Association of Australia (IFDAA, 2020), and the National Pathology Accreditation Advisory Council (NPAAC, 2013) which have specific examples of how funeral directors, and hospital and forensic mortuaries uphold respect and dignity, along with other ethical commitments. It should be noted, however, that while some of these documents are publicly available, others are hidden behind membership requirements and paywalls, are not prescriptive, or it is difficult to determine how many documents exist, and whether only portions of these documents are being selected for public viewership.

At a foundational level, some participants redacting or simply choosing not to talk about various facets of death to others could be attributed to conscious or unconscious deep-seated death anxiety and may be one of the many coping mechanisms identified for soothing or alleviating these fears (Becker, 1973; Király & Köves, 2023; Lehto & Stein, 2009; Menzies et al., 2018). Vulcan demonstrates this point by stating: ‘western culture has protected itself from the cycle of life … that harsh realities of life don’t need to be seen’. As established, many social systems strive to find ways to ‘shield their members from the anomic terrors of chaos’ which death threatens to order and meaning (Kearl, 1989, p. 25). Although Kearl illustrates the shields or ‘templates by which to focus our attention and make sense of the social world’ formed by religious institutions (Kearl, 1989, p. 174), a parallel can be seen with the death industry. For instance, the death industry may have strived to place focus onto other aspects of death such as memorials, funerals, and celebrating the person’s life rather than the state of the dead body and the processes it goes through. Further, discussions of death and dying through information evenings, cemetery, and crematorium tours, engaging with death doulas, and other death-positive movements may also shift the focus. Pax mentions that ‘offering things like advanced care planning workshops or just Death Cafes in general spaces where people can talk about what they want … and explore lots of things in those spaces’.

Despite this, it should be noted that prevalence rates of advanced care planning and directives in Australia are relatively low (White et al., 2019). Lack of public awareness and understanding of application, legalities, difficulties of facing one’s own mortality, and as also highlighted in this paper, general fear and discomfort of discussing death may all be contributing factors to low prevalence rates in Australia (Boddy et al., 2013; Bradley et al., 2014). Further, the number of Death Cafes being facilitated in Adelaide is scarce, with only one forthcoming event being scheduled in May, 2023 at the time of writing (Death Cafe, 2023). It seems that for many in the industry, a boundary has been drawn around the deceased’s body and the specific processes that happen between death and bodily preparations for final disposition. For the most part, as Apollo mentions, these have remained metaphorically and literally hidden behind closed doors:

What’s said and done in the mortuary stays in the mortuary … Within reason … because … sometimes … procedures that you have to do … people would be horrified. But you have to do something from A-Z so you’ve got to get to Z. So … what we do in there is classified.

Through this, one can suggest that a ‘template’ (Kearl, 1989) has formed wherein the body and the various processes that occur are either not the focal point or knowledge of these has been deemed unnecessary by those in the death industry to make sense of death as they may fuel anxiety, cause distress or instil chaos if fully divulged to the bereaved and general public. In turn, for many members of the public, the withholding of information or entrusting that ‘secret knowledge about the corpse’ is kept by those who work in the death industry may even be acceptable in the cultural context (Quigley, 2005, p. 305). Based on their experiences working with particularly violent deaths and the impact this had on them, Janus could understand why most people may not want to know the realities of death: ‘they’d rather stay behind the curtain rather than seeing past it’. That being said, there are exceptions and calls for change challenging this ‘template’ – but with caveats. For instance, Somnus brought up that ‘people should be aware of what the processes are that happen to their loved ones because they would actually feel … better about it’ when it came to dying and the care provided to them in a medical setting. In turn, Vesta highlighted how her workplace periodically collaborates with relevant stakeholders in order to challenge taboos with transparency and education with information seminars and facility tours: ‘my boss is very up there for educating. Educate as many people as we can, show them there’s nothing taboo about it or show them there’s nothing to hide’. The importance of education was also mentioned by Flora when discussing how her workplace offers public guided tours of their facilities: ‘we just want people to be educated that’s an important thing to us’. What can be garnered here is that while change is happening towards accessibility of knowledge and visibility of death and the body, it is still carefully planned so not everything is on display.

(In)visibility of death and the dead body

When it comes to death and in particular, the dead body, there appears to be a dichotomy of hidden and apparent, and very clear guidelines around this process. While some facets of death and the body are visible and deemed acceptable to be accessed and viewed, there is a large portion which is still hidden from those who do not have the appropriate clearances to view it. Here we discuss three main examples: the mortuary, viewings, and the dead body in virtual spaces.

The mortuary

The mortuary is a space that carries an aura of fascination, grief, mystery, repulsion, and sacredness (Brysiewicz, 2007; Horsley, 2008). For Favonius, there is a clear energy shift that occurs when entering the mortuary:

When I’m in the office or when we’re out and about we can be mucking around and joking and laughing and so on and so forth, but when we go into the mortuary, we tend to… treat the mortuary with reverence as a sign of respect.

From a literal standpoint, its location, and what happens behind the mortuary doors, in particular body handling and management procedures, are virtually invisible to those who cannot go inside, with only glimpses being offered to the outside such as pristine images of an empty mortuary, just like the first author visited. Typically, access is not granted to those who do not have the right level of clearance, reputation, or an invitation to be in there. This is not only isolated to the public; it also exists among the workers within the death industry too. Apollo, who has worked in many mortuaries, illustrated this point:

They’ve asked me to come in there, so therefore they’ve given me the tick of approval so I can go in there do it. But if you were to say ‘can I come in your mortuary?’ Buzz off. Because they don’t know you, but they know me. I’ve got a good reputation around Adelaide, that’s why I get to go.

The notion of the ‘tick of approval’ to access, enter and work in the mortuary was also mentioned by other participants. For instance, in Minerva’s role there was strict protocol in place around entry to the mortuary: ‘we weren’t the staff who had the right to waltz in without an invitation’. She further added that this protocol was also put in place to protect the deceased’s body from ‘gawkers … other people who might be in the building that are curious and don’t have any right to revoke someone’s privacy’. While Minerva did not state who the ‘other people’ were, she may have been referring to staff, or members of the public who were visiting her workplace. Gawkers, particularly in relation to members of the public, were also brought up by Caelus. When asked why there was no visible signage to point out where the viewing room was located in the hospital, he stated it was done purposefully to ‘keep the Marilyn Manson fans out’; implying that a certain type of people may be interested in accessing this part of the hospital for salacious or improper reasons.

In turn, Caelus mentioned that his workplace follows a ‘credentialing’ rule to ensure that only those with the appropriate credentials are able to gain access to the mortuary to assist or view post-mortems. This was implemented for respect towards the deceased and their families, and to keep those working with the bodies accountable and upholding legislated ethical practices. What initially started as a conversation with Caelus about physical access and visibility of the mortuary space, extended to the dead body, their parts, and tissue blocks and slides obtained from them. Caelus also discussed past ethical issues surrounding the retention of body parts after post-mortems and that post-mortem and autopsy culture around how the dead body is accessed and treated, and the importance of informed consent has shifted significantly in the last two decades (Selway, 2001).

There was a definite change in the way that the medical profession … perceived or dealt with the perception of the body because prior to that and for generations, it was the classic … person dies, family are upset … man in white coat comes in – white Anglo man, he comes in and says ‘look, sorry for your loss it’s terrible, but we really want to do an autopsy so you know, sign in here’ … What went on … during and then after was out of their control

From the data it was clear that the mortuary space was only visible and accessible to the people who work within it, those who are given a special invitation to be there, and the dead themselves. While the mortuary is used for preparations and investigations of the body, viewings and identifications of the deceased occur in their own dedicated spaces. Usually, in close proximity to the mortuary and the cool room, the viewing and identification spaces are the ‘most “public” of the mortuary spaces’ (Horsley, 2008, p. 136). While this does make death and the dead body somewhat visible and accessible to relevant people outside of the industry, it is not without curation.

Viewings and identifications

When the body does need to be viewed either for funerary rites or identification purposes, the body and these processes are carefully managed and staged. Where it is physically, practical and feasible to do so, the deceased are typically presented to the family washed, dressed and where consented, temporarily preserved or fully embalmed, and mortuary makeup is applied. For some participants, viewings or visitations of the deceased are usually recommended to be done at a funeral home as opposed to other locations such as a hospital as they have the facilities to ensure the deceased can be ‘better’ presented. As Caelus mentioned, a funeral home will ‘make them look like they’re sleeping whereas here they look like they’re dead’. Presenting the dead as sleeping was discussed by a small number of participants working across the death industry ranging from hospitals, funeral homes, and where the body was under the Coroner’s Act, that need to be viewed by the relevant members of the public. These participants mentioned that, when possible, the staging around the body would consist of carefully placed sheets, pillows and blankets to conceal body bags, extensive injuries, medical equipment, or only show the person’s face. According to many participants, this type of staging is done to present the deceased resting in a bed or appearing as asleep.

Choosing what is and is not visible to the public during viewings/visitations and identifications and who makes this decision was also discussed by participants. This is directly related to the body itself; in particular, whether a dead body could or should be made completely visible, strategically concealed, or not shown at all. In particular, if the body has extensive injuries, is significantly decomposed, cannot be reconstructed, or is an infectious risk, they are usually not accessible or are displayed under highly specific conditions. In the case of non-infectious bodies, participants identified the various ways these bodies have been made visible for viewing, such as placing a veil or netting over the deceased’s coffin, displaying them in low lighting, and in some extreme cases, strategically placing the body near an open window and using strong fans.

The decision to keep the body completely hidden or only partly visible was primarily at the discretion of those in care of the body, such as the coroner or funeral director who would forwards their recommendations or reservations to the family if they believed the body was not appropriate for viewing and/or identification. This is typically prevalent in coronial cases, when it is not possible to visually identify the deceased due to the state of the body. Instead, the coroner may forensically identify them and issue a ‘Form 8: Certificate of doctor dispensing with identification of the deceased’ (Attorney-General’s Department, 2022); one of the many applicable documents required under the Burial and Cremation Act 2013 (SA) before final disposition can occur. This overrides the need for the family to visually identify their loved one and is usually a strong indicator that access to the body should be controlled or kept completely hidden. However, as Iris highlighted, this discussion has to be done very delicately and ‘couched in reasonable terms’ to ensure no further distress is caused to the family. Somnus discussed the dilemma he and colleagues faced when deciding how much to show of someone who had died from an accident:

There’s two frames of thought: if you cover up and leave one part open it leaves the people traumatised because they think what’s the rest of the body like, and if you cover the whole body, it also traumatises because they’re thinking what’s under there that I’m not allowed to see

Research about viewing dead bodies that have experienced severe trauma due to varying circumstances is relatively scarce and only a small number of qualitative research studies have been published surrounding the positive and negative experiences, meanings, and decision-making processes of both industry and the deceased’s relatives on whether to view or not view a body after a sudden, violent or traumatic death (Chapple & Ziebland, 2010; Mowll, 2017; Mowll et al., 2016). Similar to in-the-flesh viewings and identifications, the body can also be seen and in turn, not seen through ‘virtual’ means such as websites and news media articles.

The dead in virtual spaces

Twenty-six local funeral home websites were analysed in depth, exploring the (in)visibility of death and the body through their imagery and language choices. Across all websites, the dead body was not shown. The names of the deceased, however, were displayed on twenty of these websites, which listed death notices, and/or past and upcoming services. Within this selection, some of the deceased had a photo of them alive, provided by the bereaved. Spaces were also offered for condolences: five websites provided a public message board, whereas one website opted for private messaging which only the bereaved could read. What can be elucidated from this data is that whilst the physical dead body remained hidden, curated representations of the dead such as their names, living photos, and condolences were sometimes visible. Companies also opted for extensions of the dead body or symbolic representations of death such as images of coffins, flowers, landscapes, and memorial spaces. From a business stand point, depicting the dead body is not necessarily marketable and the focus is shifted to other avenues, a point which Pax touched upon in her interview:

Funeral homes are about profit - well, not all of them, but all of them are for profit, but for them a dead body is not going to be an appropriate kind of thing because their clients… won’t… want to be into that. They’re shopping for coffins or you know flowers or whatever

There were two key exceptions drawn from the ethnographic data where imagery of the dead body was considered acceptable and displayed online and through media. Firstly, the well-known autopsy photo of ‘The Somerton Man’ (Abbott, 2023) from 1948 and footage of the exhumation process which occurred in 2021 were widely depicted in local and international mass media, books and scholarly references. The second exception was stillborn photography images which appeared on an Australian volunteer organisation website with consent from the families. These exceptions pose the question: why are these types of bodies visible whereas others are not? This seeming paradox could be understood through their specific circumstances. The Somerton Man’s death was historical, notable, and given he was unidentifiable at the time of death, a photo of his body was circulated widely at the time. This meant the photo was already in the public domain when his exhumation occurred. Furthermore, the physical state of the body may also be another factor. If a deceased person’s body has external trauma or decomposition, they are concealed or completely hidden. However, as evidenced by the photos of stillborns (and viewings of the deceased), when the dead are unmarred, presented as sleeping, and look ‘alive’ through the use of cosmetics or digital retouching, then visibility is much more likely in both virtual and physical spaces.

Conclusions

Based on the data it is evident that death and the dead body are usually kept invisible and inaccessible by members of the death industry from others such as researcher, staff without the appropriate clearances, and the general public. This is either through physical means such as keeping death in all its forms, including the body hidden, restricting relevant spaces where handling and management procedures, or withdrawing and redacting information from interviews. These aspects of death are only made visible if they have been carefully curated, staged and managed. This paper has suggested a number of possible reasons for these choices, some of which seem contradictory. These include the notion of the dead body as an abject, perceptions of death anxiety amongst the public, secrecy as maintaining social relations of the professional context, and perceptions that some of the public may be gawkers. What is clear from the data is that those who work with death and the dead in this ethnographic context have the power to maintain boundaries around their workplaces, access to the dead body and to information about the processes that they undertake. Simmel’s work (1906) on secrecy and secret societies appears relevant despite the age of this publication. While there have been some steps made by the industry to challenge or shift these approaches through education and transparency, visibility and access are still limited, particularly around the dead body itself. It is worth noting that this research only explored one viewpoint of secrecy and (in)visibility of death and the body, that of workers past and present in Adelaide in the early 2020s. A future area of research could be to explore the perspective of the general public and bereaved to determine whether they agree with the current levels of visibility and access, their attitudes towards whether they think there is secrecy within the industry, and if they believe a shift needs to occur in the way death and the dead body are approached.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to those who participated in this research project exploring death and the body. We also extend our thanks to the HDR students who offered their feedback on an early overview of this paper, and the reviewers for their helpful comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported that there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.

Notes on contributors

Annamaria Fratini

Annamaria Fratini is a Social Anthropologist and PhD candidate at the University of Adelaide. Her ethnographic research pertains to death, and theconceptualisation, handling and management of the dead human body in contemporary South Australia. Other research interests include cybersuicide and the impact this phenomenon has on society and the waysuicide is understood.

Susan R. Hemer

Susan Hemer is a Medical Anthropologist at the University of Adelaide. Her research interests revolve around health and health care, emotions and grief. She has over 20 years’ experience of ethnographic and qualitative research in Papua New Guinea, and in recent years has taken up archival research.

Anna Chur-Hansen

Anna Chur-Hansen is a Health Psychologist working at the University of Adelaide and in private practice. She researches into food, sex, pain and death, and draws on qualitative and mixed methods with an interdisciplinary lens.

Notes

1. All names in this paper are pseudonyms.