Age and Identity

Age and Identity

1. Ageism

   • Discrimination on the grounds of someone's age

2. Life Course

   • A sequence of socially defined events and roles that the individual enacts over time

3. Childhood

   • Understood here as a period of innocence, dependence and vulnerability Culture: Children in other cultures might be marrying at 13 or fighting for their country Time: Even here, children were working in factories until the mid-1800s
   • Postman (1982)
     • Childhood only emerged when the spread of literacy allowed adults to better shield their children from adult life, creating the 'innocent' child The 20th Century saw the emergence and spread of media and visual culture, which brought about a decline in childhood and threatens to ultimately wipe it out

4. Youth

   • Associated with those between 12 and 25, and is socially constructed in our culture as a period of transition from childhood to adulthood and as a time of rebellion/resistance
   • Mead (1928)
     • Says the 'storm and stress' associated with youth is culturally specific and not found in all cultures
   • Sontag (1978)
     • For women in particular, media presents youthfulness as an ideal to live up to
   • Willis (1984)
     • Youth unemployment prevents young people from taking on adult roles, causing them to become bored and demoralised
   • Muncie (2004)
     • Highlights how the media often portrays young people as troublesome and deviant

5. Old Age

   • Contested; some argue it begins at retirement age, though there is a lot of difference between 65 and 85
   • Biggs (1993)
     • Describes how old people are often portrayed in sitcoms as enfeebled, vague, or forgetful
   • Corner's (1999)
     • Participants were concerned about becoming a 'burden' themselves and the dominant stereotype they presented of later life was of ill health and dependency

6. Social Construction

   • Age can be examined either chronologically (i.e your age) as a stage in the life course When examined as a stage in the life course, age is socially constructed because it varies For example, when does childhood begin or end?

7. Young Adulthood

   • Normally characterised by moving away from home, having a career, forming relationships, and family
   • Middle-Age
     • Those who run the world, often leaving young people and older people's identities negatively affected with a lack of status and power It is sometimes seen as a negative time, with old age nearing, mid-life crises, and empty nest syndrome
     • Bradley (1996)
       • Middle-age has higher status than youth or old age, as middle-aged people run the country and hold power at work

8. Changing Age Identities

   • Postmodernists would examine trends such as living and working for longer, anti-ageing products, and the extension of 'youth' and childhood to show how age is fluid and becoming less significant today
   • Featherstone and Hepworth (2005)
     • Media images of ageing can create new identities, e.g. retro fashions and comeback tours from 1970s and 1980s bands are helping to blur the boundaries of the life course