Living connections : continuing bonds between the living and the deceased in rural Northeastern Slovenia

Kuntarič Zupanc, Simona (author)

The article explores the role of plants in mediating ongoing bonds between the living and the deceased. Drawing on ten months of ethnographic fieldwork in a rural region of northeastern Slovenia, this study focuses on three personal narratives where individuals maintain connections with deceased loved ones through plants. These natural objects – daffodils, a blooming cactus and magnolia trees – serve as material manifestations of the deceased, offering comfort, continuity and a sense of presence. Using the continuing bonds grief model (Klass & Silverman & Nickman 1996) as a theoretical foundation, the article examines how these bonds transcend traditional bereavement practices, creating everyday spaces for relational continuity. The article argues that plants act as living bridges between the living and the dead, transforming the understanding of grief into a relational process that fosters enduring connections within broader cultural and natural frameworks.

• Language: English
• Keywords: ethnology, folklore, flowers, trees, plants, bereavement practices, continuing bonds, the dead, anthropology of death, rural Slovenia
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Publication date: 01.01.2025
• Year: 2025
• Number of pages: Str. 167-186
• Numbering: Vol. 96
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-171791
• UDC: 393(439)
• ISSN on article: 1406-0957
• DOI: 10.7592/FEJF2025.96.zupanc
• COBISS.SI-ID: 246392835
• Publication date in RUL: 02.09.2025

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Folklore
• Shortened title: Folklore
• Publisher: Folk Belief and Media Group of the Estonian Literary Museum, Estonian Institute of Folklore
• ISSN: 1406-0957
• COBISS.SI-ID: 24169005

Licences

• License: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
• Description: The most restrictive Creative Commons license. This only allows people to download and share the work for no commercial gain and for no other purposes.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: etnologija, folkloristika, rože, drevesa, rastline, žalovanje, vez med živimi in mrtvimi, mrtvi, antropologija smrti, Slovenija

Projects

• Funder: EC - European Commission
• Project number: 101095729
• Name: The roles of the agency of the dead in the lives of individuals in contemporary society
• Acronym: DEAGENCY