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The main objective of this book is to add, from a humanist perspective, new interdisciplinary insights and research results to the current academic debate on aging. The collection aims to enhance and complement the predominantly biomedical and sociological debates and provide a more comprehensive and highly topical view on aging and old age. By purveying a meaning-in-life perspective to the current debate we want to enrich and to deepen the research on aging, thus aspiring to an ideal of meaningful aging. The starting point of this book is a humanistic meaning frame for addressing basic needs of a meaningful existence, such as having goals in life, a sense of self-worth, connectedness with others, moral justification, a certain degree of understanding (comprehensibility), direction and influence with a view to cohesion in life, and not in the least place: (living) pleasure or excitement. Taken together, the essays show that experiencing a meaningful life contributes to one’s mental resilience, conceived as the ability to realize a humane individuality (autonomy) in thinking and acting in situations of adversity and vulnerability, particularly those faced by older people.
How can we understand older people as real human beings, value their wisdom, and appreciate that their norms and purposes both matter in themselves and are affected by those of others? Using a life-course approach, Valuing older people argues that the complexity and potential creativity of later life demand a humanistic vision of older people and ageing. It acknowledges the diversity of experiences of older age and presents a range of contexts and methodologies through which they can be understood. Ageing is a process of creating meaning carried out by older people, and is significant for those around them. This book, therefore, considers the impact of social norms and political and economic structures on older people's capacities to age in creative ways. What real obstacles are there to older people's construction of meaningful lives? What is being achieved when they feel they are ageing well? This collection, aimed at students, researchers, practitioners and policy-makers, offers a lively and constructive response to contemporary challenges involving ageing and how to understand it.
This book focuses on ageing as a topic of philosophical, theological, and historical anthropology. It provides a systematic inventory of fundamental theoretical questions and assumptions involved in the discussion of ageing and old age. What does it mean for human beings to grow old and become more vulnerable and dependent? How can we understand the manifestations of ageing and old age in the human body? How should we interpret the processes of change in the temporal course of a human life? What impact does old age have on the social dimensions of human existence? In order to tackle these questions, the volume brings together internationally distinguished scholars from the fields of philosophy, theology, cultural studies, social gerontology, and ageing studies. The collection of their original articles makes a twofold contribution to contemporary academic discourse. On one hand, it helps to clarify and deepen our understanding of ageing and old age by examining it from the fundamental point of view of philosophical, theological, and historical anthropology. At the same time, it also enhances and expands the discourses of philosophical, theological, and historical anthropology by systematically taking into account that human beings are essentially ageing creatures.
Aging has long been of interest to scholars and practitioners in a vast array of academic fields and professions. Thomas R. Cole, Ruth E. Ray, and Robert Kastenbaum have brought together leaders from a variety of academic realms to explore how aging is depicted in the modern era and the effect of these portrayals on individuals and society. --
This collection offers a lively and creative response to contemporary challenges of ageing and how to understand it.
The various norms and values of aging that have been created by humans in the course of history have been largely ignored by gerontologists, who are thought to be more interested in the objective laws that govern science than in the subjective experiences that contribute to the aging process. This thought-provoking study belongs to the genre known as humanistic gerontology and it explores the attitudes toward aging as expressed by society. Outlining the cultural construction of old age and the social and psychological ramifications that are often imposed on the aged by external influences, it focuses on the status and treatment of old age and presents a portrait of aging in a cultural and historical perspective illuminated by diverse national literatures. Unlike any other book on the subject, this volume is an attempt to add to the body of knowledge that helps illustrate, explain, and bridge the dichotomy that still exists between the scientist and the humanist in the field of aging. The various contributors maintain a sensitivity to the continuing paradoxes associated with the aging condition and, using a historical framework, they analyze and interpret national literary conventions. This timely and incisive work examines the aging population as revealed in prominent national or regional literatures including Japan, China, South America, France, Russia, Germany, Austria, Great Britian, the United States, the Middle East, and samples from ancient Greek and Roman literature. Based on previous scholarly research, the volume provides a significant resource that deals with the universalities of the aging condition as expressed in diverse cultures and it extracts common themes and recurring images from the literature of those cultures. Perceptions of Aging in Literature will be read with interest by those engaged in gerontological research in the social and behavioral sciences and the humanities and it will be a welcome addition to all university libraries.
While humanist sensibilities have played a formative role in the advancement of our species, critical attention to humanism as a field of study is a more recent development. As a system of thought that values human needs and experiences over supernatural concerns, humanism has gained greater attention amid the rapidly shifting demographics of religious communities, especially in Europe and North America. This outlook on the world has taken on global dimensions as well, with activists, artists, and thinkers forming a humanistic response not only to traditional religion, but to the pressing social and political issues of the 21st century. With in-depth, scholarly chapters, The Oxford Handbook of Humanism aims to cover the subject by analyzing its history, its philosophical development, its influence on culture, and its engagement with social and political issues. In order to expand the field beyond more Western-focused works, the Handook discusses humanism as a worldwide phenomenon, with regional surveys that explore how the concept has developed in particular contexts. The Handbook also approaches humanism as both an opponent to traditional religion as well as a philosophy that some religions have explicitly adopted. By both synthesizing the field, and discussing how it continues to grow and develop, the Handbook promises to be a landmark volume, relevant to both humanism and the rapidly changing religious landscape.