Key Topics on End-of-Life Care for African Americans

An intellectual discourse derived from The Last Miles of the Way Home 2004 National Conference to Improve End-of-Life Care for African Americans

ABSTRACT: The Witness of History: Cultural Narratives at the End of Life   [Print Version]

Karla FC Holloway, PhD
William R. Kenan Professor of English, Law, and Women’s Studies
Duke University
Durham, NC

The deaths of African Americans throughout their history in this country too often have been marked by violence, particularly the violence of racism. In significant ways the deaths of the young of the African American community have set the public tone for the meanings of “black death.” The manners that African Americans observe and internalize the passing of their loved ones are derived from social, cultural, religious, and spiritual rituals that provide solace, hope, and unity at times of great loss and stress. The black church and family are institutions that have provided crucial sources of strength and comfort for a community that has suffered inordinately because of whom its people were: the enslaved, the emancipated, the segregated, and the integrated. Holloway recounts her exploration of “black death” in the arts, through encounters with the living, and travels to the final resting places of black folk ... everyday people and the legendary.

In Collaboration With:
Duke Institute on Care at the End of Life
Initiative to Improve Palliative Care for African Americans (IIPCA)