Twelve Aggie Angels: Content Analysis of the Spontaneous Shrines Following the 1999 Bonfire Collapse at Texas A&amp;M University

Grider, Sylvia Ann

doi:10.1007/978-1-137-12021-2_10

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…Unlike the fallen combatant, the dead honoured through spontaneous and roadside memorials may not be champions of the free world, although in Hartig and Dunn's (1998) study region of Newcastle, New South Wales, young men who died in highway tragedies 'are valorized within their milieu, using crash artefacts and personal objects as powerful signifiers at roadside memorials ' (p. 18). Similarly in Grider's (2006) study of the spontaneous shrine following the bonfire tragedy at Texas A & M University in 1999, the dead are deified as 'Twelve Aggie Angels' (p. 215). However, as with the battlefield memorial, the roadside memorial and spontaneous shrines mark the site of tragic events, consecrating the ground where individuals died.…”

Section: The Itinerant Dead and The Absent Bodymentioning

confidence: 97%

Diaspora: Death without a landscape

Baptist

2010

Mortality

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The first wake for a friend who drove too fast and died too young, the heartache that accompanied the death of a beloved pet, the loss of grandparents exacerbated by witnessing a parent's anguish, all these little sorrows did nothing to prepare me for the ferocity of grief when it arrived swift and deadly. Two parents died in rapid succession, one expected, one unexpected, one suffered long lingering death, the other a swift, painful, and reluctant extermination. The tombstones match: each born in 1935, each dead in 2004. Their deaths changed the trajectory of my research and of my life. Bereavement, as I experienced it, was corporeally paradoxical. The gravitational pull of grief was a heavy burden I carried each day, weighing me down, dragging me ever earthward. And yet, I felt at the same time unfettered and groundless, for the landscape of home and of family seemed now lost to me forever. As I drove to the cottage that summer, roadside memorials en-route would snag my glance, drawing sorrow outwards towards these markers of tragic death. No bodies lay here along the roadside and yet grief and sorrow seemed physically present; I could sense its presence within my body and the landscape. In the itinerant state of my mourning, the roadside memorials became an impetus for research, and the landscape a dwelling place for diasporic grief. As an assistant professor in landscape architecture, the role the landscape may play in the mediation of grief became of interest to me. This paper explores this question: 'Do grief and death need a landscape to dwell in?'

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Section: The Itinerant Dead and The Absent Bodymentioning

confidence: 97%

Diaspora: Death without a landscape

Baptist

2010

Mortality

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“…We avoided singling out elements which may have undermined “the study of the whole” (Fraenkel, 2011, p. 237). Like the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington DC, acquiring all the material created a populist collection “unmediated by aesthetic” or curatorial judgment (Grider, 2006, p. 229).…”

Section: Collecting the First Wavementioning

confidence: 99%

“…4 4 For example, Arvanitis (2019), Doss (2002, 2006, 2010), Eyre (2006), Grider (2001, 2006), Gardner and Henry (2002), Gardner (2011), Haney et al. (1997), Haskins and DeRose (2003), Jorgensen‐Earp and Lanzilotti (1998), Margry and Sánchez‐Carretero (2007, 2011), Milošević (2017a, 2017b), Purcell (2012), Sánchez‐Carretero (2006, 2007, 2011), Santino (2006, 2011), Senie (2006) and Ware (2017).…”

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confidence: 99%

First Wave Collecting – Christchurch Terror Attacks, 15 March 2019

Gibson

Wellington²

2023

Curator The Museum Journal

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This paper explores how the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa and Alexander Turnbull Library (a division of the National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa) responded to the outpouring of grief in the wake of the Christchurch terror attacks on 15 March 2019. This case study highlights how both institutions, at the invitation of the Wellington Islamic Centre (through the International Muslim Association of New Zealand) collected the hundreds of tributes left at Kilbirnie Mosque in Wellington. This particular acquisition required a shift from a museological object‐centred approach to an archival approach, enabling us to privilege the integrity of the whole. The authors consider the meanings and impacts of such spontaneous memorials; and discuss both the benefits and limitations of collecting material culture generated by ‘first wave’ responses to mass trauma. This case study also demonstrates what can be achieved through collaboration, drawing on aspects of professional practice and theory from across the GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums) sector.

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Pilgrimage, Mourning, and Tradition: Commemorative Rituals and Material Responses to the Death of John Paul II in Poland

Mlynarz

2010

Folklorica

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The death of John Paul II in his Vatican residence on April 2, 2005 was a date that had an immense impact upon the world and the Polish nation in particular, as a level of strength and collective unity was put on display that had rarely been seen. It resulted in the pilgrimage of over one million Poles to the Eternal City and the organization of ceremonies of mourning across the country that saw the participation of hundreds of thousands, even millions, of people. In the days following the death, Poles flocked around their hero in an unprecedented way, showing a powerful collective manifestation of modern Polish identity. In the homeland of Karol Wojtyła, the event marked not only that one of the most charismatic and influential men of the twentieth century and the head of the world's largest church had just died-for millions of Poles, a spiritual and national father had died, seen as a saint in the making and as the man who had led his people from the tribulations of centuries of dark history, leading them towards the forging of a new destiny and identity. Millions wept, lit candles, and organized marches and masses that saw attendance rise to the millions, many of them preparing for the long journey to Rome to pay their final respects to their hero. According to Piotr Wyrobiec, Director of the Cultural Centre in Wadowice, 'for Poles, his death was a time of quiet vigil, recollection, inconsolable grief, and spirituality which spread all over the country. Few remained indifferent. This collective experience made us a united community. During that week, "dying" gained a new, deep meaning. The world came to a halt, and the old rules governing our lives were no longer valid.'(1) These days were indeed marked by a collective period of remembrance, grief and commemoration. Poles of every social and political leaning worked together as a strong sense of unity and community was created throughout the country. As Britons had marked the death of Diana several years before, Poles engaged in a flurry of 'obsessive' mourning activity, including the signing of condolence books, the leaving of personalized notes, and the placing of flowers at makeshift shrines, thus marking the period with a spirit of communal social action [Johnson 18-21]. The days leading up to one of the most important funerals in history

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Twelve Aggie Angels: Content Analysis of the Spontaneous Shrines Following the 1999 Bonfire Collapse at Texas A&M University

Cited by 3 publications

References 3 publications

Diaspora: Death without a landscape

Diaspora: Death without a landscape

First Wave Collecting – Christchurch Terror Attacks, 15 March 2019

Pilgrimage, Mourning, and Tradition: Commemorative Rituals and Material Responses to the Death of John Paul II in Poland

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