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Maintaining ordinariness in dementia care
Author(s) -
Gjernes Trude,
Måseide Per
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
sociology of health and illness
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.146
H-Index - 97
eISSN - 1467-9566
pISSN - 0141-9889
DOI - 10.1111/1467-9566.13165
Subject(s) - dementia , norwegian , dignity , agency (philosophy) , psychology , social work , sociology , social psychology , nursing , medicine , political science , social science , linguistics , philosophy , disease , pathology , law
Drawing on data from fieldwork in a Norwegian care home for people diagnosed with dementia, the article focuses on how social ordinariness is produced by professional practices and co‐operation with residents. Through the lens of ethnomethodological and other pragmatist approaches to ordinariness, social agency and identity, the article uses interviews and observations to explore how residents in a care home were given the opportunity to act as ordinary persons and maintain ordinariness despite their illness. The analysis shows that a social and moral norm of ordinariness was central for how professional care work was performed in the care home. To help residents maintaining ordinariness was an essential part of caring work and to accomplish this, residents were regularly involved in activities they recognised from their everyday lives. This helped them holding on to their identities. The activities were regulated by situational rules that avoided stigmatising behaviour and maintained the residents’ dignity.