Residential Aged Care Facilities: Places for Living and Dying

Deborah Parker

doi:10.5130/csr.v17i1.1972

Cultural Studies Review 17.1 March 2011 The Death Scene: Perspectives on Mortality

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5130/csr.v17i1.1972

Keywords:

Self identity, space, place, residential aged care, scripts

Deborah Parker

University of Queensland

Abstract

This article explores residential aged care facilities (RACFs) as places of dying and death, and the role these spaces and places have in the construction of self identity for dying residents. It argues that RACFs, rather than being static places where events such as dying and death occur, are places that shape these experiences. They are social institutions where the construction of self identity for dying residents arises out of the individual experience within the setting, most specifically the experience of social interaction. Drawing on ethnographic work in two Australian facilities the article explores how macro level influences such as economic, social and political discourses intersect with micro level experiences of dying for those approaching death as well as family members and health professionals who support the dying.

Issue

Vol. 17 No. 1 (2011): The Death Scene: Perspectives on Mortality

Section

The Death Scene (Peer Reviewed)

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Author Biography

Deborah Parker, University of Queensland

Deborah Parker is the Director of the University of Queensland/Blue Care Research and Practice Development Centre (RPDC) and Director of the Australian Centre for Evidence Based Community Care (ACEBCC). She is a national and international expert in palliative care for older people.

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Deborah Parker, University of Queensland