Suchergebnisse

Intro -- AGING AND SOCIAL POLICY: A FOUCAULDIAN EXCURSION -- AGING AND SOCIAL POLICY: A FOUCAULDIAN EXCURSION -- Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data -- CONTENTS -- INTRODUCTION -- THE FRAMEWORK OF THE ARGUMENT -- i) Policy Context: A Critical Introduction and Review. -- ii) The Social Construction of Aging -- iii) Histories of the Present" -- iv) Surveillance, Power/Knowledge and the Policing of Subjects -- v) Reconstructing Aging -- RATIONALE FOR THE RESEARCH:A POVERTY OF THEORETICAL GERONTOLOGY -- i) Gerontology as "Science" -- ii) Gerontology as Policy -- iii) Gerontology as "Theoretically Sterile"? -- THE FOUCAULT "EFFECT":DISCOURSE, SUBJECT POSITIONING AND POWER -- Discoursing Subjects and Relevance to Aging Studies -- Subjectivity, Power/Knowledge and "Practices" of Discourse -- A FOUCAULDIAN "TOOLKIT" OF ANALYSIS:ARCHAEOLOGY AND GENEALOGY -- Chapter 1: THE NHS AND COMMUNITY CARE ACT (1990) IN THE UNITED KINGDOM: A CRITICAL REVIEW -- THE POLITICAL BACKDROP TO EMERGENCE OF THE NHS AND COMMUNITY CARE ACT (1990) IN THE UK -- ON THE ROAD TO CARE REFORM: COMMUNITY CARE PLC? -- RHETORIC OR REALITY? -- CONCLUSION -- REFERENCES -- Chapter 2: SOCIAL THEORY AND THE AGING BODY: THE IMPORTANCE OF THEORY -- INTRODUCTION -- OLD AGE AND THE BODY -- PHYSICAL APPEARANCE AND AGING -- BIO-MEDICINE AND THE BODY: THE TRUTH, WHOLE TRUTH AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH? -- GENDER AND THE AGING BODY -- CONCLUSION -- REFERENCES -- Chapter 3: AGING AND SOCIAL THEORY: A SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW -- INTRODUCTION -- SOCIAL THEORY AND THE RISE OF FUNCTIONALIST ACCOUNTS OF AGE AND AGING -- POLITICAL ECONOMY -- FEMINIST GERONTOLOGY -- POSTMODERN GERONTOLOGY -- CONCLUSION -- REFERENCES -- Chapter 4: ARCHAEOLOGY AND GENEALOGY: DEVELOPMENTS IN FOUCAULDIAN GERONTOLOGY -- INTRODUCTION -- UNDERSTANDING FOUCAULT -- ARCHAEOLOGY AND AGING -- GENEALOGY AND AGING -- CONCLUSION

Self-identity and personhood in social analysis : the inadequacies of postmodernism and social constructionism / Derek Layder -- Cognitive relativism : between positivistic and relativistic thinking in the social sciences / Nicos Mouzelis -- An excursus in post-postmodern social science / Roger Sibeon -- Postmodern social theory and sociology : on symbolic exchange with a "dead" theory / George Ritzer and J. Michael Ryan -- The postmodern terrorist risk : plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose / Gabe Mythen -- The perils of uncertainty : reflections on theoretical practice and graduate education / Peter Leonard and Amanda Grenier -- Masculinity as a reproduction of traditionalism, feminist reaction, and egalitarianism / Andreas Schneider -- Film, postmodernism and the sociological imagination : exploring the power of local stories in southern Korea and northern England / Sung Kyung Kim and Rob Stones -- Temporality and old age : a postmodern critique / Steven L. Arxer, John W. Murphy and Linda Liska Belgrave -- Understanding aging bodies : a postmodern dialogue on bio-medicine, body and cultural representations of identity / Jason L. Powell and Azrini Wahidin -- After postmodernism : towards an evolutionary sociology / Tim Owen -- (Dis)interring postmodernism or a critique on the political economy of consumer choice / Barry Smart

The relationship of social theory and aging: a critical exegesis -- Modern constructions of aging -- Occidental modernity, the bio-medical gaze and aging -- Theorizing aging: critical explorations of modernist sociological approaches -- Postmodern deconstructions of aging -- Postmodernism, culture and aging body -- The 'foucault effect' and aging: relations of power, surveillance and governmentality -- Aging in the 'risk society' -- Conclusion: reconstructions of aging.

Hospice care is a type of care and philosophy of care that focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill or seriously ill patient's pain and symptoms, and attending to their emotional and spiritual needs (Powell 2014). The concept of hospice has been evolving since the 11th century. Then, and for centuries thereafter, hospices were places of hospitality for the sick, wounded, or dying, as well as those for travellers and pilgrims (Dossey 1999). The modern concept of hospice includes palliative care for the incurably ill given in such institutions as hospitals or nursing homes, but also care provided to those who would rather spend their last months and days of life in their own homes (McCue and Thompson 2006)

This article is concerned with understanding the relationship of philosophical languages of death with the social philosophy of Michel Foucault. Foucault's theoretical tools 'make sense' of languages of death in institutions such as care homes. While our responses to death and dying would seem to be very personal and therefore individually determined, they are, in fact, greatly influenced by the beliefs of individuals and "experts" who work in institutions providing care. Therefore, this article not only examines the limitations of bio-medicalized languages of death and dying, but importantly emphasises the importance of Foucault's conceptual tools to methodologically interrogate how death is managed in institutional care.

This article explicates how 21st Century changes in the form of globalization are of historical scale, how they play out in terms of risks and inequalities shaping human experience, and how they have changed social welfare and public policy making worldwide. After presenting facts of inequality and such consequences as planetary poverty and gender stratification, it highlights the reformulation of economic power associated with burgeoning free-market economies and accompanying diffusion of instrumental rationality, standardization and commodification. In contrast with the recent US economic downturn and global softening of labor markets which cry for greater social protection, the welfare state of the last century has been replaced by a competitive state of the 21st century, as a "non-sovereign power" mindful of its global positioning but less powerful in shaping daily life among social forces including the role of NGOs. Indicating a lag between transnational developments and the way analysts think of social policies, the paper asserts that nation-states nonetheless serve important administrative functions in a world dominated by transnational corporate interests. In considering all the challenges to justice and governance, the authors argue that social welfare needs to be redefined and extended while market economy must be guided by moral principles that embody fundamental human values.