Dark tourism and significant other death: Towards a Model of Mortality Mediation

Dark tourism and the commodification of death has become a pervasive feature within the contemporary visitor economy. Drawing upon the thanatological condition of society and a structural analysis of modern-day mortality, this paper establishes theoretical foundations for exploring dark tourism experiences. The study argues that in Western secular society where ordinary death is sequestered behind medical and professional façades, yet extraordinary death is recreated for popular consumption, dark tourism mediates a potential social filter between life and death. Ultimately, the research suggests that dark tourism is a modern mediating institution, which not only provides a physical place to link the living with the dead, but also allows a cognitive space for the Self to construct contemporary ontological meanings of mortality.

► Dark tourism is the commodification of death, disaster or the seemingly macabre. ► Paper outlines a structural analysis of death in contemporary society. ► Mediating relationships between dark tourism and mortality are established. ► New conceptual framework proposed to examine death and dark tourism. ► Dark tourism is a mediating institution of mortality within contemporary society.