Guidelines for the Association for the Study of Death and Society

• Agreed at a meeting of ASDS Council on June 04, 2010
• The Association shall be called the Association for the Study of Death and Society. The objects of the Association shall be to foster and promote publication, conferences and multidisciplinary networks; support academic professional development; promote high quality, ethical research; shape and influence policy and practice agendas; support the teaching of death studies; promote the widespread recognition of death studies; represent the interests of the membership.
• Membership of the Association shall be open to anyone whose scholarly work and/or professional practice involves them in death studies. Membership is not restricted to UK citizens.
• The Association shall be managed by a council of no less than six and no more than fifteen members at any one time which shall include a president, deputy president, secretary, treasurer, membership secretary, website co-ordinator, postgraduate representative and three general council members who may undertake named roles such as regional rep liaison officer, early scholar representative and postgraduate representative mentor. There will also be four ex-officio members; the two editors of the journal Mortality and the organizers of the most recent and the next Death, Dying and Disposal conference. Council also has the right to co-opt one or more additional members as required at any time. All council members shall be fully paid up members of ASDS. All terms of office shall normally commence and end at an AGM. A quorum of five members, who may include the president and treasurer but not any other ex-officio members, shall be required to conduct council business.
• The deputy president, secretary, membership secretary, treasurer and website co-ordinator shall serve for a two or four year term of office to be agreed through consultation with council members. They will be selected by the council, following nominations by the council and the association’s membership and their selection presented for ratification at the AGM prior to the commencement of their term of office. The secretary, membership secretary and the treasurer can stand for re-election at any time to any office. The general council members shall serve for two or four years and will be selected in the same way as the secretary, membership secretary and the treasurer. Co-opted members will serve for two years, at which point their position will be reviewed by council.
• The role of secretary will include responsibility for media relations and publicity, to be carried out with support from council members.
• Both editors of Mortality will be ex-officio members of council, though only one would normally attend a meeting. Both are full voting members, unelected, and their term of office will be unlimited.
• The ex-officio members for DDD will be the conference organizer for the previous and the next DDD conferences, respectively. They will be full voting members, unelected, and their term of office will normally be for two years.
• The Association may incur expenditure in accordance with its aims. Costs incurred by council members unable to secure funding from their institutions and associated with council meetings of the association, including any travel and administrative expenses, can be claimed from the Association. No payments shall be made without appropriate written accounting of expenditure, using the ASDS claim form attached, and the provision of receipts.
• An Annual General Meeting of the association will be held in September each year.
• Notification of the AGM, together with an agenda, will normally be circulated to all members of the association via its web-based email list. The AGM will:
  • receive the report of the president on the activities of the Association;
  • receive the treasurer’s report and a summary of the accounts of the Association;
  • receive the membership secretary’s report, including information about any new initiatives undertaken;
  • receive a report from the editorial team of Mortality;
  • elect ordinary members to fill any vacancies on the council;
  • ratify any co-opted membership of the committee;
  • the minutes of the AGM shall normally be published on the website and be circulated by the web-based email list.
• The journal Mortality is the Association’s official journal and is currently owned by Taylor and Francis. The Social Context of Death, Dying and Disposal (DDD) is the Association’s biennial conference. The Association bears no financial liability for either Mortality or DDD.
• The Association shall make links with other professional bodies of a non-lobbying, neutral nature.