Social Identities Across the Life Course

by Jenny Hockey and Allison James

• ISBN13: 9780333912836
• ISBN10: 0333912837
• Format: Trade Book
• Copyright: 2003-01-18
• Publisher: Red Globe Pr

Summary

This text brings together sociological, anthropological, and social policy perspectives on the life course with a view to developing the conceptual rigor of the term as well as to exploring the rich range of debates and issues it encompasses. Linking traditional sociological and anthropological concerns with more recent postmodern debates centered on the self, identity, and time, the book integrates theoretical debates about childhood, youth, middle age, and later life with empirical material in an illuminating and innovative way.

Author Biography

Jenny Hockey is Senior Lecturer in Social Policy, and Allison James is Reader in Applied Anthropology, both at the University of Hull.

Table of Contents

Part I: Structure, Agency and the Life Course
Problematising Ageing and Identity	3	(19)
Introduction	3	(2)
Age and the life course	5	(4)
Identities across the life course	9	(3)
The process of age identification across the life course	12	(3)
Relations of power across the life course	15	(5)
Conclusion	20	(2)
The Structuring of Age	22	(17)
Introduction	22	(2)
Rites of passage	24	(3)
Constructing the life course socially	27	(4)
Structuring identities across the life course	31	(3)
Disciplinary orientations: rites of passage, the life cycle and the life course	34	(3)
Conclusion	37	(2)
The Experience of Time's Passage	39	(18)
Introduction	39	(1)
The temporality of the life course	40	(5)
The body, age and agency in the life course	45	(7)
Temporal experience spatialised	52	(2)
Conclusion	54	(3)
Part II: Understanding the Western Life Course
Histories of the Life Course	57	(20)
Introduction	57	(3)
Changing conceptions of age in the life course	60	(4)
A working life?	64	(2)
Ideologies of the life course	66	(6)
Age and citizenship across the life course	72	(3)
Conclusion	75	(2)
The Making of Life-course Histories	77	(21)
Introduction	77	(1)
A critical lack of fit	78	(4)
`Age' as discourse	82	(3)
Life histories, history and the life course	85	(4)
Representing the life course in time and space	89	(6)
Conclusion	95	(3)
Postmodern Lives?	98	(21)
Introduction	98	(1)
Standard life?	99	(2)
Non-standard lives?	101	(5)
Lifestyles and life strategies?	106	(3)
The age of the body	109	(2)
Diverse lives?	111	(3)
Adulthood in prospect	114	(1)
Conclusion	115	(4)
Part III: Embodying the Life Course
Revitalising the Life Course	119	(20)
Introduction	119	(2)
Towards the embodiment of identity	121	(5)
The body as the site of identification	126	(2)
The embodiment of age	128	(4)
Sites of ageing	132	(3)
Embodiment and identification	135	(2)
Conclusion	137	(2)
Gender, Sexuality and the Body in the Life Course	139	(18)
Introduction	139	(2)
Constructing sexual identities	141	(3)
Gendering sexual inequality across the life course	144	(3)
Gendered bodies across the life course	147	(4)
Gender in longevity?	151	(2)
Choice and identity across the life course	153	(2)
Conclusion	155	(2)
Family Sociality across the Life Course	157	(21)
Introduction	157	(2)
Family structures and social roles	159	(4)
Familial roles and familial identities	163	(3)
Dependency, independence and interdependence	166	(6)
Homes and families	172	(4)
Conclusion	176	(2)
Production and Consumption across the Life Course	178	(21)
Introduction	178	(2)
Becoming modern	180	(4)
Citizenship and work	184	(2)
Rethinking modernity	186	(4)
Postmodernity, work and consumption	190	(7)
Conclusion	197	(2)
Time, Memory and the Life Course	199	(16)
Introduction	199	(1)
Individual and collective identity	200	(3)
The future self	203	(3)
Reconstructing the past	206	(3)
Biography, autobiography and the ageing process	209	(3)
Past identities: the body speaks	212	(2)
Conclusion	214	(1)
References	215	(15)
Index	230