Ege University 18th International Cultural Studies Symposium, “Ageing, Surviving and Longevity" (original) (raw)
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Demographic transformation resulting from low fertility and high life expectancy in developedand developing countries has led to an increase in the numbers of elderlypeople living in those countries.Moreover,low birth rates,changingfamilystructures,and economic and political crises causing migration and flight are having as ignificant impact on intergenerational relationships,s ocial welfare systems, the job market, and on what elderlyp eople (can) expectf rom their retirement and environment.Due to these current demographic developments and changes, the categories age and aging are quicklyg ainingi ns ocietal relevance and are garnering tremendous attention in various scientific and scholarlyfields. Age(ing) is not onlyabiological and social fact but also ac ultural one. Questions of agingand demographic change, and issues of dependency and the need for care, are central concerns in Europe and in manyo therc ountries worldwide. In societies with ag rowingp roportion of older people, conceptsr elating to who the elderlya re and what agingm eansa re becomingi ncreasingly important. Ideas about what they contributet os ociety and what society gives them, what is known about older people, and how aging processes are evaluated are being put to the test,a nd the question of how older people perceive themselvesisgainingsignificance.Inall societies, concepts of life phases have developed that are reflectedinimages of old age.¹ Demographic shifts and changes to disease profiles and cultural dynamics (e. g., to familystructures,value systems, employment, health, opportunities for political and otherforms of social participation) are transformingt hese images of age, which in turn affect the role that people who are identified as "old" assume in as ociety.R eflections on old age in the arts reveal not onlythe concepts of age, role expectations, and stereotypical notions with which we encounter this stageoflife but also how expectations of age-appropriate behaviorcan be subverted, changed, and expandedupon. Yet our society stillpaysfar too little attention to the potential impact made by cultural actors on policy,s ocial programs, and medicalr esearch. The current generation and, in particular,the next generation must be prepared for an academic and economic world thatcomprises diverse ages and an agingworkforce,and for Cf. Sechster Berichtzur Lage der älterenGeneration in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland: Altersbilder in der Gesellschaft. Berichtder Sachverständigenkommission an das Bundesministerium für Familie, Senioren, Frauen und Jugend. Berlin: Drucksache 17/3815,2 010. OpenAccess. ©2 021A ndreav on Hülsen-Esch, published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the CreativeC ommons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
ANT 761: Biocultural Approaches to Aging Graduate Seminar, Fall 2018 Syllabus
This seminar will focus on human aging in biocultural perspective. We will consider how patterns and processes of human aging compare with those in other animals, particularly nonhuman primates and other hominins. Evolutionary life history theory will be employed to frame adaptive and non-adaptive views of human aging. Cross-cultural patterns in aging will be considered to highlight similarities and differences in the aging process and experience. Discussions will feature topically salient aspects of aging such as sexuality, work, grandparenting, and health. An emphasis is on student critical evaluation of aging research, including methodological approaches one might employ to address some scholarly or applied problem or question concerning human aging.
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International Perspectives on Aging, 2014
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. While the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication, neither the authors nor the editors nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein.
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In Chapter 1, I rejected the kind of gerontological research that problematises old age, but introduced some theorists (Hazan, Jung, Frank, Tornstam, Trowbridge and others) who inspired me and made a positive contribution to my thinking. This chapter examines these in more depth, and adds a number of other studies from a range of social science disciplines.
The Challenge of Cultural Gerontology
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Over the last decade, Cultural Gerontology has emerged as one of the most vibrant elements of writing about age (Twigg, J., & Martin, W. (Eds.) (2015). The Routledge handbook of cultural gerontology. London: Routledge). Reflecting the wider Cultural Turn, it has expanded the field of gerontology beyond all recognition. No longer confined to frailty, or the dominance of medical and social welfare perspectives, cultural gerontology addresses the nature and experience of later years in the widest sense. In this review, we will explore how the Cultural Turn, which occurred across the social sciences and humanities in the late 20th century, came to influence age studies. We will analyze the impulses that led to the emergence of the field and the forces that have inhibited or delayed its development. We will explore how cultural gerontology has recast aging studies, widening its theoretical and substantive scope, taking it into new territory intellectually and politically, presenting this in terms of 4 broad themes that characterize the work: subjectivity and identity; the body and embodiment; representation and the visual; and time and space. Finally, we will briefly address whether there are problems in the approach.
In this paper I will address how the life sciences have concentrated on the pathology of aging while ignoring the biocultural aspects of health in the process of growing older. I argue that growing older is a dynamic cognitive, biological and cultural coauthoring of health rather than a hopeless unfolding of progressive pathology. I propose that this fragmented concept of aging precludes operationalizing and understanding the cultural markers that affect longevity. These cultural milestones, or biocultural portals include middle age markers, retirement markers, perceived wisdom, sexuality, status in the community, transcendental beliefs, sense of empowerment vs. helplessness and any other biocultural phase in human development. I suggest that the biocultural portals define and trigger the phase transitions of life as well as influence how they are accommodated. For example, the markers for middle age established by a culture, strongly influence the cognitive and biological expectations for the second half of life.