Contesting Aging and Loss

Disease and death are a part of life, but so too is being well. The lively voices found in this book are not shy about stating the ways in which the widely held notion that they are in decline has been a far larger problem than many other features of their lives. For students, scholars, and policy makers, the message is to attend to these voices, and to design and build better programs that address the social determinants of healthy aging and social inclusion throughout the life course.

Table of Contents:
Preface Introduction: The Experience of Loss and the Range of Contestation, Janice E. Graham and Peter H. Stephenson Part I. Overview: Paradigms and Perspectives 1. Age and Time: Contesting the Paradigm of Loss in the Age of Novelty, Peter H. Stephenson Part II. Local Understanding and Knowledge about Aging: How Seniors See It 2. Losing and Gaining: About Growing Old "Successfully" in the Netherlands, Margaret von Faber and Sjaak van der Geest 3. Empowering Knowledge and Practices of Namaqualand Elders, Robin Oakley 4. La Buona Vecchiaia: Aging and Well-Being among Italian Canadians, Sam Migliore and Margaret Dorazio-Migliore Part III. Illness, Indignity, and Stigmatization 5. Drunks, Bums, and Deadbeats? A Biographical Perspective on Gender, Aging, and the Inequalities of Men, Cherry Russell 6. Dignity and Loss: Implications for Seniors' Health in Hospitalization Narratives, Christina Holmes and Peter H. Stephenson Part IV. Embodiments and Disembodiments 7. Embodied Selfhood: Ethnographic Reflections, Performing Ethnography, and Humanizing Dementia Care, Pia C. Kontos 8. The Science, Politics, and Everyday Life of Recognizing Effective Treatments for Dementia, Janice E. Graham Part V. Practices and Policies 9. "Them" are "Us": Building Appropriate Policies from Fieldwork to Practice, Janice E. Graham Appendix: Important Web Resources for Students and Researchers Notes on Contributors Index

About the Author :
Janice Graham is a professor of Paediatrics (infectious diseases) and Medical Anthropology, and the University Research Professor at Dalhousie University. Peter H. Stephenson is a Michael Smith Foundation Research Associate at the Centre on Aging, Professor of Anthropology, and Director of the School of Environmental Studies, University of Victoria, British Columbia.

Review :
Graham and Stephenson's innovative and powerful book deconstructs contemporary developments in understanding aging and loss. Rather than reinforce a convention of fatalistic language associated with loss of roles, or loss of people or loss of life, this book dramatically deconstructs long-held assumptions through consistent use of insights from Critical Gerontology. This is a breath of fresh air. The book is also very well written and the material is well packaged into a very detailed and thorough exposition. - Ageing & Society This book represents a welcome contribution to the growing Canadian literature critiquing the hegemony of the decline and loss paradigm that unfortunately underpins most discussions of aging, whether those discussions are scholarly or popular. - Canadian Journal on Aging In Contesting Aging and Loss, readers of medical anthropology and gerontology will find a rich array of academically solid case studies set in a framework of advocacy and social policy. The book is well suited for use in even undergraduate teaching, for instance in courses on the anthropology of aging or of the life course, medical anthropology, or kinship, but I hope that it also will stimulate similar research that combines an open-ended inquiry into the lives of elders with a commitment to freedom and well-being on their own terms. - Medical Anthropology Quarterly