Death dwells in spaces: Bodies in the hospital mortuary

This paper explores the idea of death spaces, in particular the ways that diverse, at times disruptive, meanings about the dead are inscribed in mortuary spaces. The author draws upon data from an ethnographic study based in a hospital's Department of Anatomical Pathology to introduce the concept of three co-constructed spaces: that of sentiment, science and spirit. The author explores the daily interactions between the living and the materially dead through description of perceptions and practices that form the discursive space of the mortuary.