Albert Banerjee | St.Thomas - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Albert Banerjee
International Journal of Care and Caring
Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks, Aug 8, 2023
Canadian Journal on Aging, 2023
The age-friendly movement aims to ensure that people can live healthy and meaningful lives as the... more The age-friendly movement aims to ensure that people can live healthy and meaningful lives as they age. It is committed to activity and inclusion, with policies, services, and structures that enable older adults to remain engaged in activities that they value. We suggest that there is further opportunity for communities to increase inclusion and reduce ageism by improving their “death-friendliness”. A death-friendly approach could lay the groundwork for a community in which people do not fear getting old or alienate those who have. To this end, we consider the merits of the compassionate communities framework which has emerged out of palliative care and critical public health. Compassionate communities focus on end-of-life planning, bereavement support, and improved understandings about aging, dying, death, loss, and care. The age-friendly and compassionate communities initiatives are complementary in their objectives but have not yet converged in practice. We suggest that they should.
Aging studies and ecocriticism, 2023
This chapter explores the existential lessons of climate change and the aging population. I sugge... more This chapter explores the existential lessons of climate change and the aging population. I suggest the climate crisis and the challenges of caring for an aging population offer rich opportunities to tell different stories about who we are and what matters. Attention to their existential dimensions reveals shared roots in narratives of mastery that have shaped western cultural and economic aspirations. It opens possibilities for new ways of being. Climate change demonstrates that we are not separate from nature, deigned with the power to control it. Rather the climate crisis reminds those who have forgotten that humans have always been part of nature and must live within its limits. Similarly, while gerontologists like myself may balk at the representation of the aging population as a “crisis,” engaging the fears underlying such notions enables a more sustainable research agenda. Rather than promoting a vision of autonomous individuals mastering aging, gerontologists have a role to play in enabling people to live with limitations, such as mortality, finitude and vulnerability. In our work with aging, gerontologists are well poised to explore forms of agency beyond control. Such an agenda will require deep transformations in the values and assumptions that have oriented the field, as well as new ways of knowing, being and doing. By grappling more honestly with limitation, gerontologists may contribute to the cultivation of sustainable ways of living in the world, as mortal beings who are part of nature.
International Journal of Care and Caring, 2023
Care Homes in a Turbulent Era: Do They Have A Future?, 2023
In this chapter, you will hear from several of the Re-Imagining Long-term Care team members who h... more In this chapter, you will hear from several of the Re-Imagining Long-term Care team members who have studied accountability extensively. The team brings expertise from different disciplines and jurisdictions. They were asked to share some of the most salient lessons they have learned through their research. While there are interesting differences among perspectives, the lessons also reveal an important re-imagining of accountability. This is a vision of accountability where the reduction or elimination for-profit participation is understood to be a central regulatory concern. We encounter strategies to ensure transparency and enforcement. We also learn about the need to use regulation to support adequate staffing and training, recognising that the conditions of work are the conditions of care. In these commentaries, accountability becomes empowering rather than punitive. It is re-imagined as a two-way street, rather than top-down, with room for interpretive approaches that enable care workers to respond to residents’ needs and even collaborate with compliance inspectors.
Journal of New Brunswick Studies, 2022
What is long-term care? Long-term care typically refers to ongoing, indefinite, care for individu... more What is long-term care? Long-term care typically refers to ongoing, indefinite, care for individuals who can no longer fully care for themselves. Long-term care straddles both health care in the form of nursing/medical care and social services in the form of income supported housing, assistance with "activities of daily living," 1 and the provision of recreational and social programs (Vladeck, 2003). Long-term care in Canada is commonly defined as representing: a range of services that addresses the health, social and personal care needs of individuals who, for one reason or another, have never developed or have lost some capacity for self-care. Services may be continuous or intermittent, but it is generally presumed that they will be delivered for the "long-term" that is, indefinitely to individuals who have demonstrated need, usually by some index of functional incapacity. (F/P/T subcommittee1988, qtd in Havens, 2002). These fact sheets are oriented by a notion of "long-term care" as referring to facilities that provide indefinite care for the elderly. Not all residents of long-term care facilities are elderly, as noted above. However, in many provinces separate facilities are provided for children and young adults; the idea being that while their health care needs may be similar their social and recreational needs are not. Such facilities and individuals are not the focus of this document. Long-term care as continuing care Long-term care is also commonly used to denote continuing forms care. As such, it may refer to hospital based continuing care, which generally tends to be more intense, complex and of shorter duration than long-term residential care. It may also be used to refer to home care or assisted living arrangements that provide basic levels of support and assume that the elderly are independently mobile and do not require 24 hour nursing care.
interculture.fsu.edu
... As Carolyn Merchant (1980) has noted, viewing nature as dead matter operating along mechanica... more ... As Carolyn Merchant (1980) has noted, viewing nature as dead matter operating along mechanical lines ... It thereby obscures another truth: that for some individuals dying may ultimately be a ... In such situations, ending one's life is portrayed as either too hastyoccurring before ...
Journal of aging studies, 2015
Drawing on feminist epistemologies, this paper attends to the way the reductionist assumptions ha... more Drawing on feminist epistemologies, this paper attends to the way the reductionist assumptions have shaped the organization of nursing home carework in manners that are insufficient to the needs of relational care. This paper is informed by a study involving nine focus groups and a survey of Canadian residential care workers (141 RNs, 139 LPNs and 415 frontline careworkers). Four major themes were identified. Reductionist assumptions contributed to routinized, task-based approaches to care, resulting in what careworkers termed "assembly line care." Insufficient time and emphasis on the relational dimensions of care made it difficult to "treat residents as human beings." Accountability, enacted as counting and documenting, led to an "avalanche of paperwork" that took time away from care. Finally, hierarchies of knowledge contributed to systemic exclusions and the perception that "careworkers' don't have a voice." Careworkers reported di...
Subcontracting long-term care (LTC), whereby facilities contracted with third party agencies to p... more Subcontracting long-term care (LTC), whereby facilities contracted with third party agencies to provide care to residents, became widespread in British Columbia after 2002. This qualitative study aimed to understand the impact of subcontracting from the perspective of care workers. We interviewed 11 care workers employed in subcontracted facilities to explore their perceptions of caring and working under these conditions. Our overarching finding was one of loss. Care workers lost wages, benefits, security, and voice. Their working conditions worsened, with workload and turnover increasing, resulting in a loss of experienced staff and a loss of time to provide care. These findings call into question the promises of quality and flexibility that legitimated policies permitting subcontracting, while adding to the mounting evidence that subcontracting LTC harms both workers and residents.
Social Science & Medicine, 2006
This paper presents a preliminary investigation of the press coverage of family assisted suicide ... more This paper presents a preliminary investigation of the press coverage of family assisted suicide in Britain during the mid to late 1990s. The newspaper articles we examine focus on court cases in which a family member had been charged with assisting a terminally ill relative to put an end to their lives. The paper aims to typify basic characteristics of the coverage and to explore their potential political implications. The observations reveal a consistently supportive stance towards family assisted suicide that is produced by depictions of dying persons and perpetrators as autonomous and conscientious individuals; by idyllic portrayals of family relations; and by praising judges for their lenient verdicts. Presentations of the law as a dated State system, as well as the marginalization of opposing voices, further enhanced the supportive message. We suggest that the commending of actors' self-reliance and the call for decreased State interference in personal affairs aligns with the neo-liberal spirit that has come into prominence in Britain since the 1980s. Within this context, we raise some questions regarding the broader political significance of such media representations.
Journal of Medical Ethics, 2007
To explore the relationship between the presentation of suffering and support for euthanasia in t... more To explore the relationship between the presentation of suffering and support for euthanasia in the British news media. Method: Data was retrieved by searching the British newspaper database LexisNexis from 1996 to 2000. Twenty-nine articles covering three cases of family assisted suicide (FAS) were found. Presentations of suffering were analysed employing Heidegger's distinction between technological ordering and poetic revealing. Findings: With few exceptions, the press constructed the complex terrain of FAS as an orderly or orderable performance. This was enabled by containing the contradictions of FAS through a number of journalistic strategies: treating degenerative dying as an aberrant condition, smoothing over botched attempts, locating the object of ethical evaluation in persons, not contexts, abbreviating the decision making process, constructing community consensus and marginalising opposing views. Conclusion: The findings of this study support the view that news reporting of FAS is not neutral or inconsequential. In particular, those reports presenting FAS as an orderly, rational performance were biased in favor of technical solutions by way of the legalisation of euthanasia and/or the involvement of medical professionals. In contrast, while news reports sensitive to contradiction did not necessarily oppose euthanasia, they were less inclined to overtly support technical solutions, recognising the importance of a trial to address the complexity of FAS.
International Journal of Care and Caring
Edward Elgar Publishing eBooks, Aug 8, 2023
Canadian Journal on Aging, 2023
The age-friendly movement aims to ensure that people can live healthy and meaningful lives as the... more The age-friendly movement aims to ensure that people can live healthy and meaningful lives as they age. It is committed to activity and inclusion, with policies, services, and structures that enable older adults to remain engaged in activities that they value. We suggest that there is further opportunity for communities to increase inclusion and reduce ageism by improving their “death-friendliness”. A death-friendly approach could lay the groundwork for a community in which people do not fear getting old or alienate those who have. To this end, we consider the merits of the compassionate communities framework which has emerged out of palliative care and critical public health. Compassionate communities focus on end-of-life planning, bereavement support, and improved understandings about aging, dying, death, loss, and care. The age-friendly and compassionate communities initiatives are complementary in their objectives but have not yet converged in practice. We suggest that they should.
Aging studies and ecocriticism, 2023
This chapter explores the existential lessons of climate change and the aging population. I sugge... more This chapter explores the existential lessons of climate change and the aging population. I suggest the climate crisis and the challenges of caring for an aging population offer rich opportunities to tell different stories about who we are and what matters. Attention to their existential dimensions reveals shared roots in narratives of mastery that have shaped western cultural and economic aspirations. It opens possibilities for new ways of being. Climate change demonstrates that we are not separate from nature, deigned with the power to control it. Rather the climate crisis reminds those who have forgotten that humans have always been part of nature and must live within its limits. Similarly, while gerontologists like myself may balk at the representation of the aging population as a “crisis,” engaging the fears underlying such notions enables a more sustainable research agenda. Rather than promoting a vision of autonomous individuals mastering aging, gerontologists have a role to play in enabling people to live with limitations, such as mortality, finitude and vulnerability. In our work with aging, gerontologists are well poised to explore forms of agency beyond control. Such an agenda will require deep transformations in the values and assumptions that have oriented the field, as well as new ways of knowing, being and doing. By grappling more honestly with limitation, gerontologists may contribute to the cultivation of sustainable ways of living in the world, as mortal beings who are part of nature.
International Journal of Care and Caring, 2023
Care Homes in a Turbulent Era: Do They Have A Future?, 2023
In this chapter, you will hear from several of the Re-Imagining Long-term Care team members who h... more In this chapter, you will hear from several of the Re-Imagining Long-term Care team members who have studied accountability extensively. The team brings expertise from different disciplines and jurisdictions. They were asked to share some of the most salient lessons they have learned through their research. While there are interesting differences among perspectives, the lessons also reveal an important re-imagining of accountability. This is a vision of accountability where the reduction or elimination for-profit participation is understood to be a central regulatory concern. We encounter strategies to ensure transparency and enforcement. We also learn about the need to use regulation to support adequate staffing and training, recognising that the conditions of work are the conditions of care. In these commentaries, accountability becomes empowering rather than punitive. It is re-imagined as a two-way street, rather than top-down, with room for interpretive approaches that enable care workers to respond to residents’ needs and even collaborate with compliance inspectors.
Journal of New Brunswick Studies, 2022
What is long-term care? Long-term care typically refers to ongoing, indefinite, care for individu... more What is long-term care? Long-term care typically refers to ongoing, indefinite, care for individuals who can no longer fully care for themselves. Long-term care straddles both health care in the form of nursing/medical care and social services in the form of income supported housing, assistance with "activities of daily living," 1 and the provision of recreational and social programs (Vladeck, 2003). Long-term care in Canada is commonly defined as representing: a range of services that addresses the health, social and personal care needs of individuals who, for one reason or another, have never developed or have lost some capacity for self-care. Services may be continuous or intermittent, but it is generally presumed that they will be delivered for the "long-term" that is, indefinitely to individuals who have demonstrated need, usually by some index of functional incapacity. (F/P/T subcommittee1988, qtd in Havens, 2002). These fact sheets are oriented by a notion of "long-term care" as referring to facilities that provide indefinite care for the elderly. Not all residents of long-term care facilities are elderly, as noted above. However, in many provinces separate facilities are provided for children and young adults; the idea being that while their health care needs may be similar their social and recreational needs are not. Such facilities and individuals are not the focus of this document. Long-term care as continuing care Long-term care is also commonly used to denote continuing forms care. As such, it may refer to hospital based continuing care, which generally tends to be more intense, complex and of shorter duration than long-term residential care. It may also be used to refer to home care or assisted living arrangements that provide basic levels of support and assume that the elderly are independently mobile and do not require 24 hour nursing care.
interculture.fsu.edu
... As Carolyn Merchant (1980) has noted, viewing nature as dead matter operating along mechanica... more ... As Carolyn Merchant (1980) has noted, viewing nature as dead matter operating along mechanical lines ... It thereby obscures another truth: that for some individuals dying may ultimately be a ... In such situations, ending one's life is portrayed as either too hastyoccurring before ...
Journal of aging studies, 2015
Drawing on feminist epistemologies, this paper attends to the way the reductionist assumptions ha... more Drawing on feminist epistemologies, this paper attends to the way the reductionist assumptions have shaped the organization of nursing home carework in manners that are insufficient to the needs of relational care. This paper is informed by a study involving nine focus groups and a survey of Canadian residential care workers (141 RNs, 139 LPNs and 415 frontline careworkers). Four major themes were identified. Reductionist assumptions contributed to routinized, task-based approaches to care, resulting in what careworkers termed "assembly line care." Insufficient time and emphasis on the relational dimensions of care made it difficult to "treat residents as human beings." Accountability, enacted as counting and documenting, led to an "avalanche of paperwork" that took time away from care. Finally, hierarchies of knowledge contributed to systemic exclusions and the perception that "careworkers' don't have a voice." Careworkers reported di...
Subcontracting long-term care (LTC), whereby facilities contracted with third party agencies to p... more Subcontracting long-term care (LTC), whereby facilities contracted with third party agencies to provide care to residents, became widespread in British Columbia after 2002. This qualitative study aimed to understand the impact of subcontracting from the perspective of care workers. We interviewed 11 care workers employed in subcontracted facilities to explore their perceptions of caring and working under these conditions. Our overarching finding was one of loss. Care workers lost wages, benefits, security, and voice. Their working conditions worsened, with workload and turnover increasing, resulting in a loss of experienced staff and a loss of time to provide care. These findings call into question the promises of quality and flexibility that legitimated policies permitting subcontracting, while adding to the mounting evidence that subcontracting LTC harms both workers and residents.
Social Science & Medicine, 2006
This paper presents a preliminary investigation of the press coverage of family assisted suicide ... more This paper presents a preliminary investigation of the press coverage of family assisted suicide in Britain during the mid to late 1990s. The newspaper articles we examine focus on court cases in which a family member had been charged with assisting a terminally ill relative to put an end to their lives. The paper aims to typify basic characteristics of the coverage and to explore their potential political implications. The observations reveal a consistently supportive stance towards family assisted suicide that is produced by depictions of dying persons and perpetrators as autonomous and conscientious individuals; by idyllic portrayals of family relations; and by praising judges for their lenient verdicts. Presentations of the law as a dated State system, as well as the marginalization of opposing voices, further enhanced the supportive message. We suggest that the commending of actors' self-reliance and the call for decreased State interference in personal affairs aligns with the neo-liberal spirit that has come into prominence in Britain since the 1980s. Within this context, we raise some questions regarding the broader political significance of such media representations.
Journal of Medical Ethics, 2007
To explore the relationship between the presentation of suffering and support for euthanasia in t... more To explore the relationship between the presentation of suffering and support for euthanasia in the British news media. Method: Data was retrieved by searching the British newspaper database LexisNexis from 1996 to 2000. Twenty-nine articles covering three cases of family assisted suicide (FAS) were found. Presentations of suffering were analysed employing Heidegger's distinction between technological ordering and poetic revealing. Findings: With few exceptions, the press constructed the complex terrain of FAS as an orderly or orderable performance. This was enabled by containing the contradictions of FAS through a number of journalistic strategies: treating degenerative dying as an aberrant condition, smoothing over botched attempts, locating the object of ethical evaluation in persons, not contexts, abbreviating the decision making process, constructing community consensus and marginalising opposing views. Conclusion: The findings of this study support the view that news reporting of FAS is not neutral or inconsequential. In particular, those reports presenting FAS as an orderly, rational performance were biased in favor of technical solutions by way of the legalisation of euthanasia and/or the involvement of medical professionals. In contrast, while news reports sensitive to contradiction did not necessarily oppose euthanasia, they were less inclined to overtly support technical solutions, recognising the importance of a trial to address the complexity of FAS.