A postmodern culture of grief? On individualization of mourning in Germany

Abstract

There have been remarkable changes in the culture of mourning in Germany. Grief aid and grief counselling have been institutionalized in many ways. Thus we face a neo-institutionalization of mourning and funeral culture at a formal, organizational level. A heterogeneous cultural subsystem of self-help groups, with and without professional guidance, counselling centres, workshops and seminars ranging from life aid to death education, has been established during the past 20 years. The question is to what extent can this be described as the development of a new culture of mourning? Do we really face a break with the cultural basics of modern, Western societies as increasingly assumed? Basically the supposed change is described as emerging from a so-called postmodern culture. Its characteristics are a higher quota of self-determination and consideration of individual interests instead of following technical guidelines. My hypothesis is that the quintessence of modern mourning culture is its individualization. But individualization of mourning already had its substructures in the 19th century: how to express grief is part of a civic culture based on private emotionality. The emotionalization of mourning was the basis for the re-institutionalization of mourning on a symbolic level. Even today a complex of reciprocal, socially established expectations defines mourning as a specific emotion of sorrow and grief. This process is generated within the new organizations for death aid and grief counselling. Thus the present changes are not the result of a break with modern culture.