Dementia Mind, Meaning, and the Person

by Hughes, Julian C.; Louw, Stephen J.; Sabat, Steven R.

• ISBN13: 9780198566151
• ISBN10: 0198566158
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2006-01-26
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Dementia is an illness that raises important questions about our own attitudes to illness and aging. It also raises very important issues beyond the bounds of dementia to do with how we think of ourselves as people--fundamental questions about personal identity. Is the person with dementia the same person he or she was before? Is the individual with dementia a person at all? In a striking way, dementia seems to threaten the very existence of the self. This book brings together philosophers and practitioners to explore the conceptual issues that arise in connection with this increasingly common illness. Drawing on a variety of philosophers such as Descartes, Lock, Hume, Wittgenstein, the authors explore the nature of personal identity in dementia. They also show how the lives and selfhood of people with dementia can be enhanced by attention to their psychological and spiritual environment. Throughout, the book conveys a strong ethical message, arguing in favor of treating people with dementia with all the dignity they deserve as human beings. The book covers a range of topics, stretching from talk of basic biology to talk of a spiritual understanding of people with dementia. Accessibly written by leading figures in psychiatry and philosophy, the book presents a unique and long overdue examination of an illness that features in so many of our lives.

Author Biography

Dr. Julian C. Hughes is currently the Chair of the Philosophy Special Interest Group of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. Dr. Stephen J. Louw is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of South Africa, of the Royal College of Physicians of London, and of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. He is currently Vice Chair of the UK Network for Clinical Ethics Committees. He was formerly Professor of Geriatric Medicine in the University of Cape Town. Prof. Steven R. Sabat is Associate Editor of Dementia: The International Journal of Social Research and Practice. He has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Greater Washington, D.C. chapter of the Alzheimer's Disease Association and has been a Co-Leader of a support group for people with Alzheimer's Disease.

Table of Contents

List of contributors	xiii
1 Seeing whole	1	(40)
Julian C. Hughes, Stephen J. Louw, and Steven R. Sabat
2 Ageing and human nature	41	(14)
Michael Bavidge
3 Dementia and personal identity	55	(8)
A. Harry Lesser
4 Identity, self, and dementia	63	(8)
John McMillan
5 Into the darkness: losing identity with dementia	71	(18)
Jennifer Radden and Joan M. Fordyce
6 Can the self disintegrate? Personal identity, psychopathology, and disunities of consciousness	89	(16)
E. Jonathan Lowe
7 Keeping track, autobiography, and the conditions for self-erosion	105	(18)
Michael Luntley
8 The discursive turn, social constructionism, and dementia	123	(20)
Tim Thornton
9 The return of the living dead: agency lost and found?	143	(20)
Carmelo Aquilina and Julian C. Hughes
10 Dementia and the identity of the person	163	(16)
Eric Matthews
11 Meaning-making in dementia: a hermeneutic perspective	179	(14)
Guy A.M. Widdershoven and Ron L.P. Berghmans
12 I am, thou art: personal identity in dementia	193	(12)
Catherine Oppenheimer
13 Spiritual perspectives on the person with dementia: identity and personhood	205	(18)
F. Brian Allen and Peter G. Coleman
14 Respectare: moral respect for the lives of the deeply forgetful	223	(12)
Stephen G. Post
15 Understandings of dementia: explanatory models and their implications for the person with dementia and therapeutic effort	235	(24)
Murna Downs, Linda Clare, and Jenny Mackenzie
16 Personhood and interpersonal communication in dementia	259	(18)
Lisa Snyder
17 From childhood to childhood? Autonomy and dependence through the ages of life	277	(10)
Harry Cayton
18 Mind, meaning, and personhood in dementia: the effects of positioning	287	(16)
Steven R. Sabat
Index	303