INFORMATION VIDEOS
The Australian Home Funeral Alliance host information session on various topics to help inform and educate anyone interested in planning or hosting a Home Funeral.
These sessions are recorded and are available for viewing by clicking on the topic which interests you.
Any information provided is general in nature and is not intended as advice or instructions.
WHAT IS A HOME FUNERAL?
ABOUT: In this recorded event, Claire Turnham and Bec Lyons share what a home funeral is and how it all works.
Claire Turnham MBE is a mother of 4 and the UK/NZ based Founder of Only with Love. As a pioneer of the home funeral movement, she is passionate about sharing her skills, knowledge and experience to help others. Claire is recognised internationally as a leading Home Funeral Practitioner, Educator, Celebrant and Advisor.
Bec Lyons is the President of the Natural Death Advocacy Network and the Australian Home Funeral Alliance. She is a Celebrant, Tedx speaker, end of life doula and independent funeral director. She is a Churchill Fellow and the author of 'A Heartfelt Undertaking'.
ARRANGING A HOME FUNERAL.
ABOUT : AHFA committee members Alex and Hini delve into how to arrange a home funeral. What does it involve and where do you start?
Alex Antunes (she/her) is a Naarm based aged care worker and holistic funeral assistant. She is the current treasurer of Natural Death Advocacy Network and a founder of Queer As Death Collective which facilitate monthly Death Cafes for LGBTQIA+ people.
Hini (they/them) hails from New Zealand, they're an indigenous Maori, queer non-binary person who has lived in Australia since 2006. They're a hospitality professional and creative event producer who's adding their weight to the death positive/ literacy movement.
AFTER DEATH BODY CARE IN THE HOME
ABOUT : After death body care in the home. People talk about home funeral, but what does it take to care for the dead?
AHFA committee member, Hallie Halloran is of Ngemba - First Nations, Irish & Belgian bloodlines explores this question during this recorded session.
Hallie is the owner of Paperbark deathcare and she offers an accessible, affordable & eco-conscious family led service offering the knowledge, advocacy & guidance, so that they may do as much or as little themselves.
BODY DISPOSAL OPTIONS
ABOUT : Bec Lyons is the President of the Natural Death Advocacy Network and the Australian Home Funeral Alliance. She is a Celebrant, Tedx speaker, end of life doula and independent funeral director. She is a Churchill Fellow and the author of 'A Heartfelt Undertaking' and has travelled the world looking at different body disposal options. During this event, Bec presented an overview of her research and findings.
WHAT DO I SAY?
ABOUT : Do you know what to say when someone is dying, or to someone recently bereaved? AHFA committee member Annie Whitlocke has years of experience to share on this topic.
Annie has completed Death Doula Australia training 1 and advanced, Death Doula Australia training Death of a Baby, Deathwalker 1 and advanced, and Midwifing Death Amicus. She works as a Clinical Pastoral Education (Monash Hospital) and sits on the advisory committee for Secular Spiritual Care Network.
CEREMONY REALLY MATTERS
ABOUT : AHFA Committee member Zenith Virago shared her decades of wisdom about creating meaningful ceremony. With a legal and community background and work history, she is a seen as a community resource, assisting people to know and reclaim their legal rights, and co-create their own social rites of passage. She has been working towards more holistic cultural change in approaches to better and continual end of life and after death care for well over 25 years.
CREATING RITUALS OF DRESS AND DEATH
ABOUT : Dr. Pia Interlandi is a designer who addresses death through dress; dress as an act, as a doing, and as a becoming (poiesis). Harnessing a toolkit of skills that combine tacit and explicit knowledge bases, Pia intermeshes scholarly and professional practice, interlacing personal reflection, community engagement, and the rigor(mortis) of academia.
Through her practice, Garments for the Grave, Pia designs rituals for facilitating dressing and addressing the dead body. She co-designs garments with the terminally ill and dresses them with family for their funerals. As an academic, her teaching and research explore the materials and materiality of death, disposal, decomposition and dispersion.
A DOULA'S SUPPORT IN DYING
ABOUT : At this event, facilitate by Tracey Rusden, we explored the role of an End of Life Doula, sometimes referred to as EOLD.
What does a doula do? At a glance, you might work with an EOLD if;​
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You are advancing in age or have a life-limiting or terminal diagnosis and want to get your 'affairs' in order.
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You want to have important discussions and conversations about end of life.
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You would like to know your options, to be prepared and organised.
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You want your wishes and preferences documented and would like support to get it sorted.
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You’re an independent thinker and have some ideas about what you want and don’t want.
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You want personalised support for you and your people, you are interested in support with advocacy.
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You want to minimise any challenges for your people.
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You like an open and honest approach.
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You want to remain in your own home.
REFLECTIONS OF MY QUEER BIRTH/DEATH RITUAL
ABOUT : In this session, will share photos and personal experiences of attempting to metaphorically dead while she reflects on the birth/death ritual she hosted - a queer death experiment.
Drawing on her experiences of working as a Personal Care Attendant and Mortician's assistant, she explores switching roles with friends. Conversations around consent, boundaries, and desires play an intrinsic role in the experiment.
BUILDING GRIEF LITERACY: THEORY, PRACTICE & PARTNERSHIPS
ABOUT : This session, with the help of Jo, will unpack the myths of griefs and include an overview of current bereavement theory. We will also explore what’s happening across the community to increase our grief literacy and how hospitals and funeral organisations can partner to provide wrap around bereavement care to clients and families.
CHOOSING A HOME FUNERAL - THINGS YOU MAY WANT TO CONSIDER
ABOUT : In this recorded session, Zenith will step you through some of the fundamental things to consider when organising a home funeral. Drawn from over 30 years of experience helping people do this, this session is aimed to expand your understanding of possible home funeral options.
COMMUNITY CAPACITY AND DEATH
ABOUT: In this session, Bec and Kaz discussed community approaches to end of life and after death care. Drawing from rich personal experiences they will talk through some of the deaths they have been a part of and in particular how Kaz’s husband Stan helped an entire community become death literate.
WAYS OF BEING WITH A FAMILY WHEN A PERSON IS DYING
ABOUT: During this session, Annie shared her own experiences and having learned the hard way what to avoid. How to take long distance separation, age, technology and disabilities into consideration during this period.
2024 DYING TO KNOW DAY EVENT
ABOUT: Living Wakes are becoming more popular with Australians as the years go by and people start to rethink funerals, celebrations, memorials and all the nice things people say when someone dies. In this special Dying to Know Day event, Annie Whitlocke and Edwin Quilliam will share their personal stories, reflections and experiences with living wakes and share when they meant and how they worked.​
LESSONS LEARNED: THE EVOLUTION OF HOME FUNERALS ACROSS CONTINENTS.
ABOUT: The UK and the USA have led the way on home funerals for decades now and as we start to build these practices and communities in Australia, it can help to know where they have come from in modern times and their history. There are lessons with what works and what does not and good people making a real difference in communities around the world. Claire and Lee will offer honest, candid conversations about home funerals and the ways in which we can build community knowledge and practice in Australia.
DECOLONISING DEATHCARE THROUGH HOME FUNERALS
ABOUT: Decolonisation is a guiding principle that guides Hini’s practice as a celebrant and death educator. In this talk, Hini shared how Indigenous knowledge informs their drive for community, connection to place and desire to normalise emotions at funerals and death spaces.
EXPLORING THE MASCULINE RESPONSE TO DEATH AND GRIEF
ABOUT: In this event Ben Gibson, host of The Mourning After Podcast, shared the insights that inspired him to create a podcast focused on the male response to death and grief. Ben discussed masculine grief styles and how men can respond to loss, highlighting impactful stories from various podcast episodes. The session included practical tools, tips, and techniques to support men both in dealing with end-of-life situations and in their after-death integration back into life.
THE ROLE OF EMBALMING IN HOME DEATH CARE
ABOUT: Amy Sagar discusses the process and role of embalming in home death care, including when it is and isn't necessary and environmentally friendly alternatives to body care.
​Amy Sagar is a funeral director for the not-for-profit funeral service Tender Funerals Illawarra which she helped open and operate in 2016. Amy has worked in funeral service for 16 years and studied embalming in 2013. You might recognise her from Australian Story which featured Tender Funerals - A Community Undertaking on ABC. Amy is now Chairperson of Tender Funerals Western Sydney leading a group of volunteers working to establish a Tender Funerals in Western Sydney.
THE BIOSCOPE AS A CARTOGRAPHIC TOOL TO FACILITATE CONVERSATIONS ABOUT DEATH.
ABOUT: Chetan Shastri's research and creative practice are situated at the intersection of design and death. During this presentation he will share the story of the Bioscope. Chetan's research and creative practice in Australia developed the Bioscope as a cartography of death and tool to facilitate conversations about end-of-life. Reviewing literature about death, co designing with palliative care practitioners, making designed artefacts and using them in community-based settings has been transformative. The research and creative practice contribute to both – how we think about design and how we think about death. Chetan will conclude the presentation by reflecting upon emerging social innovation in this space and the potential shape that his own creative practice may take in the future – specifically in the area of designing for death and dying.
Read more via The Bioscope: Codesign Enabled Conversations About Death With Palliative Care Practitioners
CREATIVITY & FUNERAL RITES; THE USE OF CREATIVE ARTS DURING WAKES, FUNERALS & MEMORIALS.
ABOUT: This presentation discusses the use of creative practices to honour those who have died/what we have lost, through funerals, memorials and events. We explore secular ritual, its use in modern Australian Funerals and ways to expand, personalise and deepen meaning-making through creativity. Joh Fairley, aka Joh Nyx (She/Her), shared images and videos of past work that she has done in developing secular art rituals around grief, loss and heartbreak.