The Sociolinguistics of Dying, Death and Mourning: Remediating Practices of Language, Narrative, and Affect in Digital Contexts

This chapter starts by discussing consistent findings that have emerged from studies in the cross-disciplinary area of death online. Noting the lack of systematic attention to language and narrative in that area, it presents a sociolinguistic approach to remediations of death, dying and mourning in social media contexts. The approach draws on the empirical framework of sharing practices (Androutsopoulos 2014), small stories research (Georgakopoulou 2015) and affective positioning (Giaxoglou 2021). This approach provides a view of death, dying and mourning as tellable and narratable in local contexts, which are to be empirically investigated. In the second part of the chapter, an illustration of the approach is offered with a sample analysis of sharing practices, namely selecting, (small) storying, and positioning in the case of influential Instagram cancer vlogger, the late Dame Deborah James - also known online as Bowelbabe. The chapter concludes with remarks on the importance of situated sociolinguistic approaches to language and death for unpacking the diverse and constantly changing practices of dying, death and mourning in social media environments.