People may seek to embody cultural ideals of the life course through their use or rejection of medical interventions, including but not limited to anti-aging treatments. Here, I analyze this phenomenon via interviews with men engaging with two different forms of sexual health medicine in urban Mexico: erectile-dysfunction treatment and testing for sexually transmitted infections (STIs). I argue that, in contrast to the biomedical understanding of patients as individuals who change during their lives, my interlocutors understood themselves as components in broader “collective biologies” that change on a longer timeline. These are culturally-defined groups that people understand to be comprised of interrelated members whose behaviors concretely affect the group’s physical and social well-being over time. In both medical arenas discussed here, men used or rejected sexual health interventions in response to local narratives about the nature of the Mexican population as a collective biology, including ideas about how it should change over time away from its roots in the colonial past. They characterized predispositions to machismo and disinterest in preventative health care as embodied inheritances that the Mexican population should reject in order to achieve health-promoting modernity in the future. My analysis describes how these interlocutors sought to live out desirably modern forms of race and gender through their medical decisions in a way that they hoped would contribute to positive, embodied change in the Mexican social body over time. These findings show that, despite the assumptions of individualism generally naturalized in anti-aging treatment and biomedicine, people may make medical decisions in an effort to aid collective change over population-level timescales.
{"title":"Time and Collective Biology: Relationships Between Individual and Societal Life Course Ideologies in Mexican Men’s Sexual Health Treatment","authors":"E. Wentzell","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.232","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.232","url":null,"abstract":"People may seek to embody cultural ideals of the life course through their use or rejection of medical interventions, including but not limited to anti-aging treatments. Here, I analyze this phenomenon via interviews with men engaging with two different forms of sexual health medicine in urban Mexico: erectile-dysfunction treatment and testing for sexually transmitted infections (STIs). I argue that, in contrast to the biomedical understanding of patients as individuals who change during their lives, my interlocutors understood themselves as components in broader “collective biologies” that change on a longer timeline. These are culturally-defined groups that people understand to be comprised of interrelated members whose behaviors concretely affect the group’s physical and social well-being over time. In both medical arenas discussed here, men used or rejected sexual health interventions in response to local narratives about the nature of the Mexican population as a collective biology, including ideas about how it should change over time away from its roots in the colonial past. They characterized predispositions to machismo and disinterest in preventative health care as embodied inheritances that the Mexican population should reject in order to achieve health-promoting modernity in the future. My analysis describes how these interlocutors sought to live out desirably modern forms of race and gender through their medical decisions in a way that they hoped would contribute to positive, embodied change in the Mexican social body over time. These findings show that, despite the assumptions of individualism generally naturalized in anti-aging treatment and biomedicine, people may make medical decisions in an effort to aid collective change over population-level timescales.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"66-80"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48880206","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Europe, a growing population of aging citizens have migrant background, and many have their origin in non-Western countries. Often, care arrangements in these families are different from those of the majority populations. In Denmark, a growing number of immigrant families utilise an option in the Social Service Act, under which municipalities can contract a family member to take care of an elderly citizen at home. Due to the special construct of the ‘self-appointed helper arrangement’, the caregiver is both a professional care worker, formally employed by the municipality, and a close relative. As such, the arrangement provides a unique opportunity to examine ideas and practices of care at the intersection of the immigrant family and the state. Based on data from interviews with and observations among both immigrant families and municipal care managers, we explore consequences of this care scheme for aging citizens and their self-appointed helpers. Drawing on the concept of ‘lenticular subject positions’, we show how both the self-appointed helpers and the care managers adopt two different, often contradictory, perspectives or subject positions simultaneously. In all, we argue that the self-appointed helper arrangement constitutes a grey zone in the Danish public health care system, since both care managers and helpers seem to neglect the national legislation and standard procedures, in relation to the elders and the general work environment. The consequences are most severe for the self-appointed helpers who end up in a particular precarious position at the margins of the Danish labor market.
{"title":"Between Care and Contract: Aging Muslim Immigrants, Self-appointed Helpers and Ambiguous Belonging in the Danish Welfare State","authors":"S. L. Sparre, Mikkel Rytter","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.279","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.279","url":null,"abstract":"In Europe, a growing population of aging citizens have migrant background, and many have their origin in non-Western countries. Often, care arrangements in these families are different from those of the majority populations. In Denmark, a growing number of immigrant families utilise an option in the Social Service Act, under which municipalities can contract a family member to take care of an elderly citizen at home. Due to the special construct of the ‘self-appointed helper arrangement’, the caregiver is both a professional care worker, formally employed by the municipality, and a close relative. As such, the arrangement provides a unique opportunity to examine ideas and practices of care at the intersection of the immigrant family and the state. Based on data from interviews with and observations among both immigrant families and municipal care managers, we explore consequences of this care scheme for aging citizens and their self-appointed helpers. Drawing on the concept of ‘lenticular subject positions’, we show how both the self-appointed helpers and the care managers adopt two different, often contradictory, perspectives or subject positions simultaneously. In all, we argue that the self-appointed helper arrangement constitutes a grey zone in the Danish public health care system, since both care managers and helpers seem to neglect the national legislation and standard procedures, in relation to the elders and the general work environment. The consequences are most severe for the self-appointed helpers who end up in a particular precarious position at the margins of the Danish labor market.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"112-128"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49110800","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Film Review: Mother","authors":"Karen Lok Yi Wong","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.351","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.351","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"183-185"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49141869","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Knowledge claims may play an essential role in reproductive decision-making, as individuals seek out, assess, reject, and use information about health and fertility gathered from numerous sources. This paper focuses specifically on childless women’s self-perceptions of knowledge about infertility and age-related fertility decline. How knowledgeable do childless women perceive themselves to be about fertility and infertility in general, and from where they do they obtain this knowledge? Furthermore, how knowledgeable do childless women perceive themselves to be about their own fertility and ability to conceive, and to what do they attribute this knowledge? Data for this project was gathered through semi-structured interviews with 72 childless American women; the interviews were inductively and thematically coded using qualitative-analysis software. Childless women assessed their general knowledge of fertility as confident , self-doubting , or novices , and they claimed multiple sources as the basis of this knowledge, including formal education and training, media and popular culture, and family members and peers. When assessing knowledge about their own fecundity, the women tended to rely on two additional sources: biomedical diagnostics and embodied knowledge. Childless women’s awareness of average statistics of age-related fertility decline did not necessarily translate to individual self-knowledge about their own bodies and fecundity. Because knowledge claims were based on multiple information sources given unequal weight, this raises questions about authoritative knowledge—that is, the knowledge that “counts” for women as they make decisions regarding their future childbearing.
{"title":"Knowing and Not Knowing about Fertility: Childless Women and Age-Related Fertility Decline","authors":"L. Martin","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.259","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.259","url":null,"abstract":"Knowledge claims may play an essential role in reproductive decision-making, as individuals seek out, assess, reject, and use information about health and fertility gathered from numerous sources. This paper focuses specifically on childless women’s self-perceptions of knowledge about infertility and age-related fertility decline. How knowledgeable do childless women perceive themselves to be about fertility and infertility in general, and from where they do they obtain this knowledge? Furthermore, how knowledgeable do childless women perceive themselves to be about their own fertility and ability to conceive, and to what do they attribute this knowledge? Data for this project was gathered through semi-structured interviews with 72 childless American women; the interviews were inductively and thematically coded using qualitative-analysis software. Childless women assessed their general knowledge of fertility as confident , self-doubting , or novices , and they claimed multiple sources as the basis of this knowledge, including formal education and training, media and popular culture, and family members and peers. When assessing knowledge about their own fecundity, the women tended to rely on two additional sources: biomedical diagnostics and embodied knowledge. Childless women’s awareness of average statistics of age-related fertility decline did not necessarily translate to individual self-knowledge about their own bodies and fecundity. Because knowledge claims were based on multiple information sources given unequal weight, this raises questions about authoritative knowledge—that is, the knowledge that “counts” for women as they make decisions regarding their future childbearing.","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"30-48"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44896384","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Older Women Who Work: Resilience, Choice, and Change","authors":"Urša Bratun","doi":"10.1037/0000212-000","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1037/0000212-000","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46304623","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Elderly Care, Intergenerational Relationships and Social Change in Rural China","authors":"Mengxin Ma","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.346","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.346","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"170-172"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45417983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Creative Care: A Revolutionary Approach to Dementia and Elder Care","authors":"Joy M Ciofi","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.341","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.341","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46035246","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review: Caring for the People of the Clouds: Aging and Dementia in Oaxaca","authors":"Cíntia Engel","doi":"10.5195/AA.2021.343","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5195/AA.2021.343","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p>n/a</jats:p>","PeriodicalId":42395,"journal":{"name":"Anthropology & Aging","volume":"42 1","pages":"164-166"},"PeriodicalIF":1.1,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41348803","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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