The idea
This project will explore and preserve the social history of bereavement, grief, and community support in Walsall over the past 30 years.
Working with local residents—including people who have experienced bereavement, carers, volunteers, and community partners—we will collect and share personal stories that reflect how experiences of grief, loss, and support have changed over time.
While rooted in the history of Walsall Bereavement Support Service, the project focuses more broadly on Walsall’s collective experience of bereavement, capturing how local attitudes, services, and community responses have evolved.
We will co-produce a public exhibition and digital archive to ensure these stories are preserved and accessible to the wider community. This will create a lasting record of an often underrepresented aspect of local heritage—how people experience, understand, and support one another through loss.
The project will also explore heritage and bereavement in the context of dementia, capt
What we'll deliver
- Co-ordinate and organise a celebration event across both our services
- Research how bereavement and grief has changed on a localised level
- Collate a digital archive of the service across the years
- Develop Dementia and Loss training package
- Deliver celebration and exhibition event
- Deliver 2 x training package to local carers/employers groups
Why it's a great idea
This project will explore and share an often underrepresented aspect of Walsall’s heritage: the lived experience of bereavement, loss, and community support.
We will work with local people to capture personal stories, memories, and reflections on bereavement and how it has been experienced and supported within the community over the past 30 years.
Rather than formal oral history collection, we will use accessible and flexible engagement methods such as small group discussions, one-to-one conversations, written reflections, and creative activities. This approach will enable a wider range of people to participate in a way that feels comfortable and appropriate.
Through this process, we will:
• Explore how experiences of bereavement have changed in Walsall
including attitudes, stigma, support networks, and community understanding
• Gather a diverse range of community voices
including people with lived experience, carers, volunteers, and local partners
• Create a lasting heritage resourc
Steps to get it done
- Allocate administrative support - co-ordination and delivery
- Plan/prepare data gathering methods, create survey/reflections packs
- Undertake data capture - engage surveys, contact volunteers, promote evnet
- Plan/develop celebration event and digital product
- Deliver celebration event and launch digital archive
