A Facebook R.I.P. Group and Charlotte Eades' Video Diary

Abstract

The public Facebook R.I.P. group was created in 2012 as a tribute to a young adult aged 18, who died in a car crash just eleven days before his school graduation. His classmates created this Facebook memorial group as a way of extending socially, spatially and temporally the memorials and vigils held in the community immediately after his passing. The different tributes flooding the memorial wall attest to individual moments of remembrance in the here-and-now, recording personal reactions, thoughts and feelings about their loss; in the process, this community of mourners is collectively (re)writing the life of their dead friend as a life worthy of being mourned and celebrated.   Charlotte Eades' Video Diary:  this compelling video diary of living with terminal illness renders tellable and visible not only the ‘small’ and ‘big’ battles with cancer, but also the everydayness of life with and despite dying.