A morte nos vivos: pequenas histórias de vida e morte

Abstract

Why do we avoid thinking about our own death and the death of those we love? Why does death frighten us so much? Why do we pretend that death is dead? When these questions became part of my intimate and daily reflections, this work started to live. In the search for possible answers, I came across other questions: Why did I, a teacher of two subjects [Science and Biology] dedicated to the study of life and the multiple ways in which it presents itself, had never discussed, in my classes, aspects related to human death? How does one talk about death in a classroom? Is a Death Education possible? The texts that constitute this thesis reflect the uncertainties and possibilities that go through these questions: 1. In the opening text - Is death dead? - it is possible to find the theoretical-methodological foundation that guided the development of this research; 2. Part I - Reliving life in death - portrays some of my intimate experiences related to death and the process of dying and, maybe, the reading of these stories may help in understanding how I got here; 3. Part II – Reliving death in another’s life – can be read as my field work’s result, which focused on answering the following question: What meanings do Elementary Students (last years) give to death itself and the process of dying? Looking for these meanings, I observed, listened to and read a set of accounts of experiences lived and shared by the boys and girls who were a part of this study. The analysis/interpretation of these accounts will be presented through short stories about living people and living stories about the dead; 4. Finally, each reader can still lean on a brief afterword or transitory final remarks. I hope that this set of texts may open space, in some awareness, for more intimate dialogs about death, and, who knows, talking and meditating about death we can better hear the concerns of our lives. All stories gathered here are lived, felt, reinvented, and imagined. These are stories that reflect not only death, but what we can perceive and risk discussing: Death in the living.