Third Places for the Unspeakable: Death Cafés and the Mediation of Mortality in Urban China

This study examines the emergence of Death Cafés as informal settings that enable public engagement with mortality in a context where death discourse remains culturally constrained. Drawing on participant observation and 15 semi-structured interviews, the analysis adopts a socio-spatial perspective to explore not only what is discussed, but how such discussions become possible. The findings identify four interrelated mechanisms—boundary-making, thematic framing, interactional scaffolding, and material-symbolic mediation—through which Death Cafés afford conditions of safety, openness, and participation. Through these mechanisms, death is reconfigured from a culturally taboo subject into a collectively negotiated topic, enabling emotional expression, reflection, and informal learning. Theoretically, the paper contributes to debates on urban space and informal publics by advancing a mechanism-based account of socio-spatial affordances, showing how grassroots spatial practices actively produce the conditions under which culturally sensitive discourse becomes possible.