four - Thinking and talking differently

Summary

Introduction

While ideas associated with a social citizenship approach to practice may be conceptually intriguing, their real value lies in their potential to inform practice. In this chapter we argue that the first step in changing practice is to become more aware of the ways that we support and/or inadvertently sabotage the realisation of a critical social citizenship in people with dementia. Thus, the purpose of this chapter is to begin to demonstrate how analysing the situation of people with dementia from a sociopolitical perspective rooted in social theories of lifecourse, disability and citizenship can change the way we think about people with dementia. This includes challenging our own attitudes, beliefs and values about their rights and issues.

In order to frame this discussion we will draw on the ideas of post-structuralism to examine the power of language for constructing how we think and act. The main idea posited here is that at a very general level our understandings and actions are informed and shaped by the language that is available to us for making sense. Following a brief overview of the rationale behind this statement, we will then identify some of the problematic and limiting ways that language is implicitly used to understand dementia experiences. We highlight the need to begin to explicitly interrogate how we use language to tease out the underlying assumptions, values and beliefs that are guiding how we understand and interact with people who have dementia. Alternative ways for reframing and using language differently, to draw on ideas more consistent with a critical social citizenship approach, are then discussed.

Power of language

“The more familiar they are with me, I feel more at ease. You know, if they want to call me [by my first name] Annie, fine. But … there are only a certain type of people that insist on that.” (older woman living with dementia in a residential care setting)

In a small study comparing the experiences of residents with dementia living in a long-term care facility to those without dementia conducted by one of the authors (DO), one of the striking differences that began to emerge was the importance that those with dementia placed on how they were named.