Suchergebnisse

This article analyzes the contemporary construction of male menopause as a clinical disorder. While medical interest in a male climacteric has waxed and waned over the past century, the past decade has witnessed a surge of both scientific and commercial interest in its diagnosis and treatment. In explaining why this is the case, the author suggests that shifting cultural narratives of aging and sexuality, rather than any new scientific evidence, are central to the construction of the aging male body as a pivotal site of biomedical intervention. The clinical and market success of Viagra has been critical in the development of a men's health industry, creating novel discursive and institutional structures that have fostered the medicalization of masculinity in middle and late life. The article analyzes clinical research, popular science reporting, and pharmaceutical marketing to demonstrate how the newly remedicalized male menopause has crystallized anxieties about aging in terms of biochemical de-masculinization.

This article locates classical sociology within the context of widely circulating scientific 'truths' about sexed bodies, exploring how the emerging discipline of sociology both drew on and contributed to the construction of a scientifically grounded sexual dimorphism. Through an examination of Durkheim's theory of conjugal society and Weber's writings on the routinization of sexual conduct, the extent to which anxieties about masculine sexuality animated classical conceptions of the shifting mind/body relationship in modernity is illuminated. This is read alongside a shared problematic in the sexual science of the time - concern over the relationship between 'modern' life and male sexual dysfunction. I argue that the manner in which both sociology and sexual science problematized male sexuality as a pivotal issue of modernity is illustrative of the construction of a fundamentally gendered ontology of the social. I argue that the actively internalized struggle of mind and body in sociology's men renders them universally individual, whilst its women are collectively particular, and that this is a legacy with which social theory continues to struggle.

Je passe en revue, dans cet article, certains problèmes clés des théories socialistes‐féministes de la reproduction de ľoppression des femmes; et j'appelle à un dialogue plus soutenu entre théorie féministe et 'théorie critique'. Bien que cette dernière ait jusqu'à maintenant peu étudié les questions de sexe, on les trouve en filigrane dans les thèmes principaux de la théorie critique. De plus, ces questions représentent une illustration de choix du besoin de reformulation des problématiques marxiennes traditionnelles si ľon veut mieux comprendre les formes complexes de domination inexplicables par la relation capital/salaire. Je crois qu'il est possible de reconstruire la théorie féministe au moyen de la théorie critique de façon à plus clairement articuler le role de ľaction sociale dans la reproduction et la transformation des structures de domination; cette reconstruction pourra aussi fonder la transformation socialiste sur la base de valeurs féministes.This paper reviews key problems in current socialist‐feminist theories of the reproduction of women's oppression, and argues for increased dialogue between feminist theory and 'critical theory'. While gender has not been a focus of critical theory, it is implicated in its central themes, and provides a ready illustration of the need to reframe the traditional Marxian problematic to more adequately understand complex forms of domination that cannot be explained by the capital/wage relationship. It is suggested that work in the tradition of critical theory may be instructive in reconstructing socialist feminist theory to articulate more clearly the role of agency in both reproducing and transforming structures of domination, and in grounding feminist values as a basis for socialist transformation.

Critically interrogates sociological theory from a feminist perspective and embarks on a politics of reconstruction, working at the interface of feminist and sociological theory to induce an adequate conceptualisation of the social. This text is useful for undergraduate and postgraduate students in sociology and feminist theory.

In previous work we argued that ageing bodies and changes across the life-course were becoming measured, standardised, and treated according to a new logic of functionality, supplanting traditional categories of normality (Katz/Marshall 2004). In particular, the binary between the 'functional' and the 'dysfunctional' has become a powerful tool in mapping and distributing bodies around datapoints, functional subsystems, and posthuman informatics. In this paper, we extend this line of analysis by exploring how current developments in self-tracking technologies and the proliferation of digital apps are creating new modes and styles of 'quantified ageing'. In particular, we identify four interrelated fields for inquiry that are specifically relevant in setting out a research agenda on ageing quantified selves and statistical bodies: 1) 'Wearables' and mobile technologies, including both technologies designed for selfmonitoring/self-improvement (health, fitness, sleep, mood and so on) and those designed for surveillance of and 'management' of ageing individuals by children, caregivers or institutions. 2) Digital apps, including those that collect and connect data uploaded from wearable devices, and those that deploy various algorithms for 'calculating' age and its correlates. 3) The rhetorics of games and scores in age-related apps such as those used in digital 'brain training' games that track a person's imagined cognitive plasticity and enhancement, while promising protection against memory loss and even dementia. 4) The political economy of data sharing, aggregation and surveillance of ageing populations. Conclusions ponder wider sociological questions; for example, how will the insurance industry acquire and use data from digital health technologies to produce new actuarial standards? How will older individuals plan their futures according to the risks assembled through quantifying technologies? We argue that the technical turn to new ways of quantifying and standardising measurements of age raises a range of complex and important questions about ageism, agency and inequality.

Historically, male sexual fitness was framed by a patriarchal politics of life centred on regeneration, population and nation. In the later 20th century, as successful ageing became promoted by the lifestyle practices of an idealized healthy and active senior citizenry, traditional gerontocratic power over the sexual risks of youth gave way to a medical sexology concerned with sexual functionality across the lifecourse; in particular, erectility. Recently, erectile dysfunction has expanded to become a population-wide health problem with increasingly refined diagnoses based on `phases', `early warning signs' and preventative regimes, especially as Viagra has become so widely available. This article explores a new bodily configuration in the making; arising, on the one hand, from the pharmacological and scientific technologization of male sexuality, and, on the other, from a contemporary politics of life that both contests the late-life ageism of the past and fosters a mid-life ageism in the present.

"The Encyclopedia of Social Theory provides a reference source for students and academics, embracing all major aspects of the field. Written by more than 200 internationally distinguished scholars, almost 500 entries cover core contemporary topics, concepts, schools, debates, and personalities in the history of the discipline. Special attention is paid to leading schools and debates, with shorter entries reserved for biographies of key theorists and definitions of key terms. Entries are fully cross-referenced and contain concise listings for further reading. A comprehensive index guides the reader to further divisions of contents."--BOOK JACKET

"Social change in the 21st century is shaped by both demographic changes associated with ageing societies and significant technological change and development. Outlining the basic principles of a new academic field, Socio-gerontechnology, this book explores common conceptual, theoretical and methodological ideas that become visible in the critical scholarship on ageing and technology at the intersection of Age Studies and Science and Technology Studies (STS). Comprised of 15 original chapters, three commentaries and an afterword, the book explores how ageing and technology are already interconnected and constantly being intertwined in Western societies. Topics addressed cover a broad variety of socio-material domains including care robots, the use of social media, ageing in place technologies, the performativity of user involvement and public consultations, dementia care and many others. Together, they provide a unique understanding of ageing and technology from a social sciences and humanities perspective and contribute to the development of new ontologies, methodologies and theories that might serve as both critique of, and inspiration for, policy and design. International in scope, including contributions from the UK, Canada, USA, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Austria, The Netherlands, Spain and Sweden, Socio-gerontechnology is an agenda-setting text that will provide an introduction for students and early career researchers as well as more established scholars that are interested in ageing and technology"--