Thinking About Dementia: Culture, Loss, and the Anthropology of SenilityAnnette Leibing, Lawrence Cohen Cultural responses to most illnesses differ; dementia is no exception. These responses, together with a society's attitudes toward its elderly population, affect the frequency of dementia-related diagnoses and the nature of treatment. Bringing together essays by nineteen respected scholars, this unique volume approaches the subject from a variety of angles, exploring the historical, psychological, and philosophical implications of dementia. Based on solid ethnographic fieldwork, the essays employ a cross-cultural perspective and focus on questions of age, mind, voice, self, loss, temporality, memory, and affect. Taken together, the essays make four important and interrelated contributions to our understanding of the mental status of the elderly. First, cross-cultural data show the extent to which the aging process, while biologically influenced, is also very much culturally constructed. Second, detailed ethnographic reports raise questions about the behavioral criteria used by health care professionals and laymen for defining the elderly as demented. Third, case studies show how a diagnosis affects a patient's treatment in both clinical and familial settings. Finally, the collection highlights the gap that separates current biological understandings of aging from its cultural meanings. As Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia continue to command an ever-increasing amount of attention in medicine and psychology, this book will be essential reading for anthropologists, social scientists, and health care professionals. |
Contents
1 | |
Changes in Clinical Practice | 21 |
The Role of Genomics in Alzheimers Research | 121 |
The Organization of Voice Self or Personhood | 155 |
Other editions - View all
Thinking about Dementia: Culture, Loss, and the Anthropology of Senility Annette Leibing,Lawrence Cohen No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
activities allele Alzheimer's disease American Anthropology ApoE Apolipoprotein argued associated behavioral bimah biomedical bodily body boke Bourdieu brain caregivers Center Chai Village clinical clinicians cognitive impairment coherence concept condition context criteria cultural database death demented depression described developing diagnosis Disorders doctor elderly example experience family members Fine's frontotemporal dementia functioning genes genetic Geriatric Gerontology Graham Gubrium ikigai illness individuals Institute interaction International Psychogeriatrics internists interviews Journal Kanegasaki knowledge living meaning Medical Anthropology medicine memory menorah ment mental health mentia Merleau-Ponty moral narrative neurologists Neurology normal norms nosology nursing home old age one's participants pathological patients percent person personhood physicians practice problems Psychiatry Regina Pacis relation residents responsibility risk selfhood senile dementia senility Simchat Torah social Society somatic specific staff stigma story storytelling structure suffering TimeSlips tion Tran Traphagan understanding University Press vascular dementia verpleeghuis York