Annette 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.

Culture, Loss, and the Anthropology of Senility

Thinking about Dementia

Athena McLean

The Shadow Side of Fieldwork draws attention to the typically hidden or unacknowledged aspects of ethnographic fieldwork encounters that nevertheless shape the resulting knowledge and texts. Addressing these invisible, elusive, unspoken or mysterious elements introduces a distinctive rigor and responsibility to ethnographic research. Luminaries in anthropology dare to explore the 'unspeakable' and 'invisible' in the ethnographic encounter Considers personal and professional challenges (ethical, epistemological, and political) faced by researchers who examine the subjectivities inherent in their ethnographic insights Explores the value, and limitations, of addressing the personal in ethnographic research Includes a critical discussion of the anthropologist’s self in the field Introduces imaginative rigor to ethnographic research to heighten confidence in anthropological knowledge

Exploring the Blurred Borders between Ethnography and Life

The Shadow Side of Fieldwork

Cultural responses to most illnesses differ; dementia is no exception.These responses, together with a society's attitudes toward its elderlypopulation, affect the frequency of dementia-related diagnoses and thenature of treatment. Bringing together essays by nineteen respectedscholars, this unique volume approaches the subject from a variety ofangles, exploring the historical, psychological, and philosophicalimplications of dementia. Based on solid ethnographic fieldwork, theessays employ a cross-cultural perspective and focus on questions ofage, mind, voice, self, loss, temporality, memory, and affect. Takentogether, the essays make four important and interrelated contributionsto our understanding of the mental status of the elderly.

Silke Schicktanz

The conceptualization of dementia has changed dramatically in recent years with the claim that, through early detection and by controlling several risk factors, a prevention of dementia is possible. Although encouraging and providing hope against this feared condition, this claim is open to scrutiny. This volume looks at how this new conceptualization ignores many of the factors which influence a dementia sufferers’ prognosis, including their history with education, food and exercise as well as their living in different epistemic cultures. The central aim is to question the concept of prevention and analyze its impact on aging people and aging societies.

Annette Leibing

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