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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| The lobby as an arena in the confrontation between acceptance and denial of old age | | Author(s) | Tova Gamliel |
| Journal title | Journal of Aging Studies, vol 14, no 3, September 2000 |
| Pages | pp 251-272 |
| Keywords | Access areas ; Sheltered housing ; Care homes ; Sociology, Social Science. |
| Annotation | In two anthropological studies on old-age institutions, the lobby is found to be an arena in which one may examine older people's styles of coping with the end of life. The lobby appears to symbolise the socio-existential situation of today's older people, and gives a credible view of two separate types of institutions: sheltered housing and the residential home. Three levels of context are examined: the static "set" in the lobby; the traffic of tenants and others through it; and the extent of freedoms in its access. The article concludes that each institutional context "promotes" a different style of coping. Sheltered housing tenants cultivate a middle-aged identity, in which they deny the fact that they are old. Those in the residential home accept the manifestations of old age, and conduct an overt discourse with death. The reality of life in an institution as one that forces people to cope with questions of identity in old age creates an appropriate background for discussing the costs and utilities of each style of coping. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-001114207 A |
| Classmark | YC3: KLA: KW: S |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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