ABSTRACT
It is not immediately obvious that there exist any entirely feminist perspectives on death and dying or, if they exist, how they might relate to medical law. Death happens to people from all walks of life and people of all ages, and as a consequence it appears to be universal, apparently transcending social class, ethnicity, sexuality and gender. Yet when death occurs, it impacts not only upon its immediate victim but also on anyone who is associated with its victim, and the ways in which it is experienced are coloured by the characteristics of the individual who is encountering it. Women are uniquely involved with deaths that occur at the extremes of the usual span of human life; it is they who primarily care for the elderly within our society and they who must experience miscarriage, abortion and neonatal death in a way which is specific to their gender.
