Introduction

Luhmann (1982, p 232) has asserted that the “evolution or modernization of society has often been described as a process of increasing system differentiation and pluralization”. One dimension of these dynamic processes is the acquisition and constant renegotiation of ‘boundary roles’. Boundary roles are those that have potential to transform social relations and cultural practices through drawing ideas and experiences across arenas (Luhmann, 1982, p 236). For example, the woman who engages in paid employment while retaining the main responsibility for domestic and caring work may be in such a role. Thus she may identify herself as a worker and a carer and as someone who must manage the boundaries of the public and private. This fluid or porous boundary has the potential to transform her sense of self and shift the perceptions of others. In this chapter, we discuss some of the key issues that frame women's health and well-being at mid-life to explore these ideas further. In particular, we concentrate on how health and well-being intersect with women's structural and familial circumstances, and their views and experiences of caring roles. We illustrate our arguments by drawing on a qualitative study of women in their fifties carried out by the authors.

Gilleard and Higgs comment that “times change and ageing too is changed by time”. They assert that the contemporary experience of ageing now encompasses a greater diversity in cohort, class and gendered relations than existed for previous generations and that these social and demographic changes “render less possible any common cultural position than can be popularly represented as ‘ageing’” (Gilleard and Higgs, 2000, p 8). One feature of this changing ageing process is that the fifties may be differentially experienced by social class and gender and reflect an increasingly complex and diverse experience of social and economic structures (Arber and Ginn, 1995; Benson, 1997; Sulkunen et al, 1997; Gilleard and Higgs, 2000). In these respects, changing experiences of ageing may challenge the boundaries between expectations of personal and social life at midlife and the often contradictory realities facing individuals.