Uploaded June 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
My guest Samantha Waite is the quirky founding director of Taboo Education who works with individuals and groups in local, national (Australia) and international communities to resolve our taboo and confusion in talking about death. She is a long-time performing arts enthusiast as well as a trained counselor and youth worker with training in thanatology, psychotherapy and public health. She discusses some of the cultural differences around death and dying between the US and Australia and what Australia is doing right in terms of end-of-life care. Learn more at her website:
tabooeducation.com
This episode includes:
-How Samantha started Taboo Education
-Why she chooses to dress in Victorian mourning clothes and how it serves her message
-Why we sometimes wish people still wore mourning attire
-Cultural differences between Australia and the U.S. in the death and funeral industry
-Which countries have the best end-of-life care (and why some wealthy countries are failing)
-Why the US is 43rd globally in providing care at end of life
-Issues for healthcare providers around seeing death as a failure
-The death doula movement in Australia
🍃 Subscribe to my email list: eepurl.com/ExfLL
🍂 Support your local bookstore by buying my books on Bookshop: bookshop.org/lists/books-by-karen-wyatt-md and Indiebound:
7 Lessons for Living from the Dying : indiebound.org/book/9781786783110
The Journey from Ego to Soul: indiebound.org/book/9780982685563
🍃 Subscribe to this podcast on
Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/end-of-life-university/id1033282990
Google: podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9sZXNzb25zZnJvbWR5aW5nLndvcmRwcmVzcy5jb20vZmVlZC8
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/7bdr4odBlaaDy8NoJhcFsL
iHeart Radio: iheart.com/podcast/256-end-of-life-university-31099550
Stitcher Radio: stitcher.com/show/endoflife-university
🍂 Check out the Series I’ve recorded in the past: eolupodcast.com/series
🍃 Join the team at my Patreon page patreon.com/eolu and get access to the EOLU mug: “Mind if we talk about death?” (only Patrons can purchase it). PLUS get our new bonuses: the monthly EOL News Update, movie reviews from 2 Doctors and a Movie, and automatic access to A Year of Reading Dangerously!
🍂 Intro Music Credit:
"Bright Wish" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
My guest Samantha Waite is the quirky founding director of Taboo Education who works with individuals and groups in local, national (Australia) and international communities to resolve our taboo and confusion in talking about death. She is a long-time performing arts enthusiast as well as a trained counselor and youth worker with training in thanatology, psychotherapy and public health. She discusses some of the cultural differences around death and dying between the US and Australia and what Australia is doing right in terms of end-of-life care. Learn more at her website:
tabooeducation.com
This episode includes:
-How Samantha started Taboo Education
-Why she chooses to dress in Victorian mourning clothes and how it serves her message
-Why we sometimes wish people still wore mourning attire
-Cultural differences between Australia and the U.S. in the death and funeral industry
-Which countries have the best end-of-life care (and why some wealthy countries are failing)
-Why the US is 43rd globally in providing care at end of life
-Issues for healthcare providers around seeing death as a failure
-The death doula movement in Australia
🍃 Subscribe to my email list: eepurl.com/ExfLL
🍂 Support your local bookstore by buying my books on Bookshop: bookshop.org/lists/books-by-karen-wyatt-md and Indiebound:
7 Lessons for Living from the Dying : indiebound.org/book/9781786783110
The Journey from Ego to Soul: indiebound.org/book/9780982685563
🍃 Subscribe to this podcast on
Apple: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/end-of-life-university/id1033282990
Google: podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9sZXNzb25zZnJvbWR5aW5nLndvcmRwcmVzcy5jb20vZmVlZC8
Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/7bdr4odBlaaDy8NoJhcFsL
iHeart Radio: iheart.com/podcast/256-end-of-life-university-31099550
Stitcher Radio: stitcher.com/show/endoflife-university
🍂 Check out the Series I’ve recorded in the past: eolupodcast.com/series
🍃 Join the team at my Patreon page patreon.com/eolu and get access to the EOLU mug: “Mind if we talk about death?” (only Patrons can purchase it). PLUS get our new bonuses: the monthly EOL News Update, movie reviews from 2 Doctors and a Movie, and automatic access to A Year of Reading Dangerously!
🍂 Intro Music Credit:
"Bright Wish" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
