The Meaning of Care: The Social Construction of Care for Elderly People

by Bernhard Weicht

Overview

Bernhard Weicht provides a multi-layered analysis of how we understand and construct care in everyday life, the meanings it has for ourselves, our families, our relationships, identities and our sense of society and what is right and proper, making an original contribution to the discussion of the nature of care ethics and its political potential.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137274939
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	04/29/2015
Edition description:	2015
Pages:	255
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.02(d)

About the Author

Bernhard Weicht is Lecturer at Leiden University College, The Netherlands. Bernhard has researched and published on the construction of care, ideas of dependency, migrant care workers, the intersection of migration and care regimes, and the construction of ageing and older people. He is vice-chair of the European Sociological Association Research Network 'Ageing in Europe'.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction 2.Who Should Care? The Construction of Caring Relationships 3. Where Should Care be Given and Received? The Geographies of Care 4. How Should Communities Care? Nostalgia and Longing for the Ideal 5. Who is Seen to be Care For? The Construction of the Care Receiver 6. Buying and Selling Care? The Intrusion of Markets and Bureaucracy 7. Epilogue Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

The Meaning of Care mainly discusses the construction of informal care for older people in European countries. … The aim of the book is to demonstrate how discourses of care are interlinked with moral constructions, nostalgia and gendered practices. … I see it as a valuable contribution to any education that involves care. And in an educational context it might even be advantageous that it is reiterative.” (Janicke Andersson, Community, Work & Family, Vol. 19, January, 2016)

'This book takes a close look at discourses on informal elder care and break down the dichotomies inherent in the meanings of care. This is an essential reading for those interested in care.' - Minna Zechner, Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences, Finland

From the Publisher