Old Age And Agency

This book is about rethinking the ways in which we make sense of social action or agency in later life. The contributions in this collection challenge traditional academic approaches to the study of later life, which, arguably, often deny older people agency. Social gerontology, and the wider society, should be more reflexive and rather than contribute to the continued marginalisation of older people, should draw attention to the extent to which the latter's actions may be understood within the set of normalising discourses which people have to manage and negotiate as they get old. The purpose of this collection is to continue this process, by providing philosophical, theoretical, conceptual and empirical direction for a reflexive social gerontology. This book argues that the management of later life has become complex, caught as it is within a broad discourse which continues to construct old age as a time of decline and dependency but has shifted the burden of responsibility for the avoidance of decline on individuals.

Author, activist, and TED speaker Ashton Applewhite has written a rousing manifesto calling for an end to discrimination and prejudice on the basis of age. In our youth obsessed culture, we’re bombarded by media images and messages about the despairs and declines of our later years. Beauty and pharmaceutical companies work overtime to convince people to purchase products that will retain their youthful appearance and vitality. Wrinkles are embarrassing. Gray hair should be colored and bald heads covered with implants. Older minds and bodies are too frail to keep up with the pace of the modern working world and olders should just step aside for the new generation. Ashton Applewhite once held these beliefs too until she realized where this prejudice comes from and the damage it does. Lively, funny, and deeply researched, This Chair Rocks traces her journey from apprehensive boomer to pro-aging radical, and in the process debunks myth after myth about late life. Explaining the roots of ageism in history and how it divides and debases, Applewhite examines how ageist stereotypes cripple the way our brains and bodies function, looks at ageism in the workplace and the bedroom, exposes the cost of the all-American myth of independence, critiques the portrayal of elders as burdens to society, describes what an all-age-friendly world would look like, and offers a rousing call to action. It’s time to create a world of age equality by making discrimination on the basis of age as unacceptable as any other kind of bias. Whether you’re older or hoping to get there, this book will shake you by the shoulders, cheer you up, make you mad, and change the way you see the rest of your life. Age pride! “Wow. This book totally rocks. It arrived on a day when I was in deep confusion and sadness about my age. Everything about it, from my invisibility to my neck. Within four or five wise, passionate pages, I had found insight, illumination, and inspiration. I never use the word empower, but this book has empowered me.” —Anne Lamott, New York Times bestselling author

An experiential guide to re-orienting our understanding of late adulthood as one of life's most meaningful and transformative stages Aging can bring new fears, challenges, and concerns. Loss of career, loved ones, or changing physical and cognitive abilities can leave us feeling isolated and scared. Sandi Peters shows us that growing older need not mean the end of personal growth. In fact, late adulthood can prove to be the most meaningful and transformative period of one's life. The key, says Peters, is the development of one's inner life, and with it a shift in one's relation to the aging process. The book draws on history, philosophy, psychology, gerontology, and spirituality to deepen and expand our understanding of what it means to grow old in the twenty-first century. Peters shares time-tested contemplative practices such as meditation, active imagination, dream work, and creative writing designed to enhance one's inner worlds and enable us to face life's inevitable changes with equanimity and insight. She offers practical advice on issues such as assisted living and home care, and a refreshingly new perspective on matters of memory and cognitive change.

As humans live longer, the elderly population increases, and the challenges we face in addressing their needs continue to evolve. This book explores the theoretical and practical issues raised by advanced aging in the contemporary world. Developing new sociological theory, Paul Higgs and Chris Gilleard suggest that mental and physical frailty forms a central theme in narratives about deep old age and that discussions of personhood are needed to address this concept. After examining key terms like personhood, the fourth age, frailty, and abjection, Higgs and Gilleard consider the broader implications of these concepts for issues of care--both its meanings and its management. As the care needs of the elderly and options for meeting these needs grow more complex, it is important to examine our collective hopes and fears concerning the end of life, including questions about personhood and expectations for the quality and content of end-of-life care.

Family caregiving affects millions of Americans every day, in all walks of life. At least 17.7 million individuals in the United States are caregivers of an older adult with a health or functional limitation. The nation's family caregivers provide the lion's share of long-term care for our older adult population. They are also central to older adults' access to and receipt of health care and community-based social services. Yet the need to recognize and support caregivers is among the least appreciated challenges facing the aging U.S. population. Families Caring for an Aging America examines the prevalence and nature of family caregiving of older adults and the available evidence on the effectiveness of programs, supports, and other interventions designed to support family caregivers. This report also assesses and recommends policies to address the needs of family caregivers and to minimize the barriers that they encounter in trying to meet the needs of older adults.

In gerontological research the understanding of age and ageing changed in the last decade. Biologic determined explanations no longer prevail in this research field. Instead, ideas of social constructivism are frequently used. These ideas define the state of age and the process of ageing as social constructions, steeping ageing in social and cultural assumptions, ascriptions, and expectations. From a social constructivist perspective, age and ageing are not (just) identified as dependency, deficit, and need for care – as it was foremost accelerated from a biological perspective – but with the life course and thus with individual lifestyles, experiences, attitudes and practices, as well as institutional and economic structures. A prominent social constructivist concept is “doing age.” Similar to “doing gender” the concept of “doing age” assumes age as taking place in the form of a social praxis within everyday life interactions between people and thus in performances, embedded in discourses, through which social hierarchies and ideals proceed. Despite the paradigm shift that social constructivist concepts enable in gerontological thinking, they reveal their blind spot when it comes to the materiality of ageing and thus to fleshy-sensual experiences, human and non-human ontologies and agencies. Addressing these materialities of ageing brings up its own critique on definitions of ageing bodies and material environments. This framing does not presume that age and ageing are solely products of human-to-human interactions or those of formative environments or of discourses. Rather humans, non-humans, and discourses become essential parts of ageing processes. Such a material framing enables us new insights into forms of age and ageing and thus offers an opportunity for scholars to engage critically with materialities of age and ageing. This eBook explores theoretical, methodological, and empirical concepts of such a 'Material Gerontology'.

Motivated by the steady increase in the population of older migrants worldwide, this book acknowledges the diversity within this population group and provides an interdisciplinary and multi-level approach for studying older migrants’ strategies to overcome vulnerability. The book brings together original research on the topics of diversity among older migrants, social vulnerability, loneliness, (transnational) care and support networks. Based on a review of the growing literature on the topic of older migrants and anchored in the empirical findings discussed in the chapters, the book puts forward a general approach to study older migrants as social actors who develop strategies to surpass vulnerabilities. As documented by empirical research, older migrants mobilise their resources and are able to deal with structural opportunities and restrictions operating at meso and macro levels. These strategies are placed at the intersection between family obligations and resources, social networks, and migration and care regimes. The interdisciplinary and multi-level research in this book acknowledges the heterogeneity within the population of older migrants and puts forward research results that have implications for policies targeting the growing population of older migrants. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.