Erica Borgstrom is Professor of Medical Anthropology at The Open University in the United Kingdom. She leads Open Thanatology, The Open University's interdisciplinary research group for the study and education of death, dying, loss, and grief across the life course, and is co- editor-in-chief for the interdisciplinary journal Mortality and Bristol University Press book series Death and Culture.

Renske Visser is a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Oulu in Finland. She runs the blog Dead Good Reading ([...] featuring books about death, dying, and loss. She also co-hosts The Death Studies Podcast. She was previously the administrator for the Association for the Study of Death and Society (ASDS).

Chapter 1: Introduction. Section I: Populations, Politics, and Society. Chapter 2: Thinking With and Beyond Mortality Statistics. Chapter 3: Policy and Death. Chapter 4: Mass Death Events and Shifting Death Practices. Chapter 5: Social Movements and Death. Section II: Dying. Chapter 6: Medicalisation of Dying. Chapter 7: Palliative Care and the Modern Hospice Movement. Chapter 8: Assisted Dying. Chapter 9: Disenfranchised Dying. Section III: The aftermath of death. Chapter 10: The Dead Body and Disposal Practices. Chapter 11: Grief Theories and Therapies. Chapter 12: Suicide. Chapter 13: Conclusion.