Ars Moriendi

As a short story "Ars Moriendi," the art of dying, pays tribute to how social science and its methods such as autoethnography can enhance our understanding of life and death. Contrasting the limited medical technologies of the past with the abilities of the present, this story once told to me by my father, an oncologist/hematologist, captures the human element in the act of dying. Often, our culture works diligently to treat death as an obstacle to overcome, not something to embrace when its time has come. "Ars Moriendi" also pays tribute to my father and to the many medical professionals who aim to preserve life, and yet understand that death also needs to be accepted, artfully.