Dennis Class

Dennis Klass (born May 28, 1940 ) is an American religious psychologist and professor emeritus.

Life

Dennis Klass completed his studies in religious psychology with a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago .

He was active in research on the subjects of death, dying and loss. This focus of his work began in 1968 when he worked as an assistant in the “Dead and Dying Seminar” conducted by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross at the University of Chicago Hospitals . Klass taught as a professor at Webster University , St. Louis , Missouri , USA. He now lives in Collington near Washington, DC.

In the literature, the concept of “continuing bounds” that he had formulated about the deceased was received. Mourners are faced with the task of developing and shaping these enduring bonds. This concept represents an important alternative to Sigmund Freud 's concept of the task of "letting go".

Main research areas in the course of his professional biography

• Themes around death, dying and loss
• Therapeutic treatment of difficult and ´complex losses
• Grief of parents who lost their children to death (from 1979).
• Cross-cultural research on grief
• Rituals in Cultures and How They Maintain Enduring Attachments with the Dead
• Religious Psychology

Awards

• Kemper Award for Outstanding Teaching (Webster University)
• Missouri State Governors Award for Excellence in Teaching
• Appreciation Award ( The Compassionate Friends National Board) (1992)

Participation in committees, professional associations and self-help organizations

• Death Studies (member of the editorial board)
• Omega, Journal of Death and Dying (Member of the Editorial Board)
• International Work Group in Death, Dying, and Bereavement.
• St. Louis Chapter of Bereaved Parents (Professional Advisor)

Works (selection)

Publications in book form

• with Audrey Gordon, They Need to Know. How to Teach Your Children About Death , Prentice-Hall 1979, ISBN 978-0-139171-04-8 .
• Parental Grief: Solace and Resolution (= Springer Series on Death and Suicide), Springer Pub Co 1988, ISBN 978-0-826159-30-4 .
• with Phyllis R. Silverman (Ed.), Steven Nickman (Ed.), Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief (Death Education, Aging and Health Care) , Taylor & Francis 1996, ISBN 978-1-560323-39-6 .
• The Spiritual Lives of Bereaved Parents (= Series in Death, Dying, and Bereavement), Routledge 1999, ISBN 9780876309919 .
• with Robert E. Goss , Dead but not Lost. Grief Narratives in Religious Traditions , AltaMira Press 2005, ISBN 978-0-759107-89-2
• with Ulrike Winkler (translator), Parents Mourning Souls Life. The spiritual life of grieving parents (= Huttenscher Verlag, Volume 507), Würzburg 2010, ISBN 978-3-930823-02-4 .

Articles in compilations (selection)

• with Karola Müller (Übers), Tiefer Kummer und Trost , in: Monika Müller (Ed.), with Sylvia Brathuhn (Ed.), Matthias Schnegg (Ed.), Thorsten Adelt (Collaboration), Theo Breidbach (Collaboration), Christine Fleck -Bohaumilitzky (assistance), Felix Grützner (assistance), Martina Kern (assistance), Dennis Klass (assistance), Bianca Papendell (assistance), David Pfister (assistance), Rita Rosner (assistance), Martin Weber (assistance), Sabine Zwierlein -Rockenfeller (cooperation), and Friedemann Nauck (preface), handbook of grief encounters and accompaniment. Theory and Practice in Hospice Work and Palliative Care, Göttingen 2013, ISBN 978-3-525-45188-5 , pp. 108–119.

Journal articles (selection)

• Spiritual bonds to the dead in cross-cultural and historical perspective: comparative religion and modern grief , in Death Studies, Volume 22, 1999, pp. 547-567.
• with Robert A. Neimeyer and MR Dennis, A social constructionist account of grief. Loss and the narration of meaning , in: Death Studies, Volume 38, 2014, pp. 485–498.