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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Older women's relations to bodily appearance
— the embodiment of social and biological conditions of existence | | Author(s) | Alex Dumas, Suzanne Laberge, Silvia M Straka |
| Journal title | Ageing and Society, vol 25, part 6, November 2005 |
| Pages | pp 883-902 |
| Source | http://journals.cambridge.org/ |
| Keywords | Older women ; Attitude ; Physical characteristics [elderly] ; Biological ageing ; Personality ; Social class ; Qualitative Studies ; Canada. |
| Annotation | Our understanding of older women's relations to bodily appearance is examined and explored by looking at two different conditions of existence. Recent literature has touched on the experiences of older women in societies with youthful norms of beauty, but the diversity of older women's experiences has been little explored, and there has been little dialogue between theoretical writing and empirical research on the topic. This article is part of an empirical study of older women's relations to bodily appearance, in which Pierre Bourdieu's sociological theory is applied, particularly the concept of habitus to the body. Qualitative, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 51 francophone women aged 65-75 from working class and affluent neighbourhoods of Montreal (Quebec, Canada). The findings showed clearly that, despite the social differentiation associated with variations in economic and cultural capital, older women's relations to bodily appearance converged as they aged. Two previously unidentified and overlapping processes of attitudinal change were recognised: differentiation by social class; and convergence with increasing age. The embodiment of women's social and biological conditions of existence are discussed in the context of personal ageing. The notion of age-habitus is introduced to explain how older women maintain their social value in the context of omnipresent youthful ideals of beauty for western women. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-051125004 A |
| Classmark | BD: DP: BA: BH: DK: T: 3DP: 7S |
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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