PSB 67(2) 2021
Thanabotany: the Emerging Field Where Plants, People and Death Intersect
Imagine this: it’s 2018 and an independent thanatologist from Cincinnati, Ohio embarks on a research fellowship exploring the intersection of plants, people, and death. What results is a new field of study called thanabotany. Three years later, this emerging field now has students and researchers from 20 different countries around the world.
I am that independent thanatologist who made her way into the world of botany through that fellowship. If thanatology is a new word for you, you’re not alone. Put most simply, thanatology is the study of death and dying. The word thanatology was coined in 1905, yet, things have been dying long before 1905! Take this as proof of how death-avoidant humanity truly is. I am a dual-certified thanatologist and will be triple-certified later in 2021. I’m interested in changing the way we approach death and loss in my lifetime, and that’s my life’s mission. Thanabotany is a part of that. Thanabotany is the word I coined to describe this emerging field, and I’m excited to share with all of you what’s happened in the last three years. Hopefully, I’ll lure some of you over! By Cole Imperi Thanatologist, Chaplain, Deathworker Founder, School of American Thanatology E-mail: cole@americanthanatology.com
While under a fellowship, funded by the Lloyd Library & Museum, I was shocked to discover that there weren’t really any texts solely dedicated to discussing how plants have been used for death, dying, grief, loss, and bereavement, despite the fact that every human being experiences death and loss. Every living thing dies, so how were there no books focused on this specific area? So many religions, cultures, and communities have plant-based rituals across time and into modern day that prescribe how specific plants are to be used before death, at death, and after death. How was there no guidebook?! How was there no central text?
WHAT IS THANABOTANY? Thanabotany is where ethnobotany—the study of the plant–person relationship—intersects with thanatology—the study of death and dying. In thanabotany, we want to understand how humans have used plants to deal with death, dying, grief, loss, and bereavement. From funerary rituals to body preservation to social behaviors, thanabotanical practices appear across different times, cultures, religions, and countries. Under my fellowship, it was a challenge to find information about these practices offered as a primary focus. I have a huge research database at this point, and all of the information about these practices have been pulled out of books
101
