UNSPECIFIED (2000) Chronic illness as biographical disruption or biographical disruption as chronic illness? Reflections on a core concept. [Journal Item]

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Abstract

Taking as its point of departure Bury's (1982) concept of chronic illness as biographical disruption, this paper provides a critical assessment of its fortunes since that time. Having 'rescued' the concept from recent postmodern and disability critiques, the paper provides a series of further reflections on its strengths and weaknesses, including the notion of 'normal illness'; the importance of timing and context; the significance of continuity as well, as loss; and the role of biographical disruption itself in the aetiology of illness. This, in turn, provides the basis for a broader set of reflections on the vicissitudes of the biographically embodied self in conditions of late modernity: a situation of chronic reflexivity in which our badies/selves are continually problematised if not pathologised. The paper concludes, given this 'balance sheet', with a discussion of some potentially fruitful lines of future research, including links with the life-events and inequalities literature.

Item Type:	Journal Item
Subjects:	R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine > RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine H Social Sciences H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Journal or Publication Title:	SOCIOLOGY OF HEALTH & ILLNESS
Publisher:	BLACKWELL PUBL LTD
ISSN:	0141-9889
Date:	January 2000
Volume:	22
Number:	1
Number of Pages:	28
Page Range:	pp. 40-67
Publication Status:	Published
URI:	http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/id/eprint/13757

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