Narrative Gerontology: The Importance of Storytelling in Understanding Aging, Slides of Gerontology

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James Muruthi & Courtney Reynolds

 Studying aging by obtaining critical events as told by

and the older adult (Kenyon and Randall, 2001)

 “I have read several of the stories and enjoyed them

because they paint such a nice, detailed picture of

the person. It gives you another angle as to who (the

residents are).”

 Source: Enriching now with then: Connecting nursing home residents and Staff through oral history by Mike Payne (2011)

Narrative Gerontology

 Individuals tell and live their stories  Stories consist of facts and potentiality (ability to change in different contexts)  Narratives are multidimensional and dynamic  Narratives do not provide absolute truths

• Structure of committed or unique time.
• Generic particularity, they all fall in some genre or group (myths, legends, or folktales).
• Individuals’ actions have reasons.
• Empirical or rational evidence for actions.
• Authenticated within a given context.
• References in a narrative tend to be ambiguous.
• Centrality of trouble – common theme; fixing problems.
• Stories’ importance, meaning, and relevance can be contested.
• Stories follow certain temporal order.

• Examines age over periods of time
• Emphasis on:
  • structural processes
  • time and timing/chronological age
  • linked lives
  • individual agency
• Contextualizes a person’s life

Narrative Gerontology

1. Humans simultaneously tell and live stories

Life Course

Perspective

A. Provides one of the most “authentic” measures of the human experience.

Narrative Gerontology

3. Narratives are multi- dimensional. ◦ Structural ◦ Social ◦ Cultural ◦ Personal Life Course Perspective C. Aggregation of many narratives may enable researchers to find structural and personal commonalities.

Narrative Gerontology

4. Narratives do not provide us with any absolute truths. They explain part of a larger story. Life Course Perspective D. No story, and, therefore, no life is more or less important than any other.

Before we take your questions, we’d like to give a special thank you to:  Dr. Jennifer Kinney, Miami University  Dr. Robert Applebaum, Miami University  Our classmates at Miami University  All of you for joining us today!

 Bruner, J. S. (1996). The Culture of Education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.  Kenyon, G. M., Ruth, J., & Mader, W. (1999). Elements of a Narrative Gerontology. In V. L. Bengston & K. Warner Schaie (Eds.). Handbook of Theories of Aging (pp.40-58). New York: Springer Publishing Company.  Randall, W. L., Kenyon, G. M., Kenyon, G. M., & Randall, W. L. (2001). Ordinary wisdom: Biographical aging and the journey of life. Westport, Conn. [u.a.: Praeger.