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Chapter 7 - Slow Emergency

Life Writing, Dementia, Gender, and Care

from Part I - Intimacies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2021

Jean M. Lutes
Affiliation:
Villanova University, Pennsylvania
Jennifer Travis
Affiliation:
St John's University, New York
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Summary

This chapter considers how Alzheimer’s narratives written by and about women are using literary forms to explore the relations among gender, personhood, and care. Feminist theory has developed a powerful arsenal for challenging ageism directed toward the female body and the social devaluation of aging women but has been less adept at reframing narratives about dependency and cognitive change that inevitably come with advanced age, and are amplified by age-related Alzheimer’s. I argue that narratives Gerda Saunders and Elinor Fuchs highlight the limitations to our current ways of imagining the gendering of age-related dependency, and offer ways of thinking otherwise. I am particularly interested in how narrative portrays the temporalities of dementia; how individual narratives manage the formal challenges of representing a self that is in the process of being irrevocably transformed; and how, in the bleakest situations, care givers and receivers find glimpses of unexpected intimacy, compassion, and interconnection.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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  • Slow Emergency
  • Edited by Jean M. Lutes, Villanova University, Pennsylvania, Jennifer Travis, St John's University, New York
  • Book: Gender in American Literature and Culture
  • Online publication: 01 April 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108763790.008
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  • Slow Emergency
  • Edited by Jean M. Lutes, Villanova University, Pennsylvania, Jennifer Travis, St John's University, New York
  • Book: Gender in American Literature and Culture
  • Online publication: 01 April 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108763790.008
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Slow Emergency
  • Edited by Jean M. Lutes, Villanova University, Pennsylvania, Jennifer Travis, St John's University, New York
  • Book: Gender in American Literature and Culture
  • Online publication: 01 April 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108763790.008
Available formats
×