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The Age of Spectacular Death
by Michael Hviid JacobsenThis book explores death in contemporary society – or more precisely, in the ‘spectacular age’ – by moving beyond classic studies of death that emphasised the importance of the death taboo and death denial to examine how we now ‘do’ death. Unfolding the notion of ‘spectacular death’ as characteristic of our modern approach to death and dying, it considers the new mediation or mediatisation of death and dying; the commercialisation of death as a ‘marketable commodity’ used to sell products, advance artistic expression or provoke curiosity; the re-ritualisation of death and the growth of new ways of finding meaning through commemorating the dead; the revolution of palliative care; and the specialisation surrounding death, particularly in relation to scholarship. Presenting a range of case studies that shed light on this new understanding of death in contemporary culture, The Age of Spectacular Death will appeal to scholars of sociology, cultural and media studies, psychology and anthropology with interests in death and dying.
The Age of Structuralism: From Levi-Strauss to Foucault
by Edith KurzweilStructuralism began in linguistics and was enlarged by Claude Levi-Strauss into a new way of thinking that views our world as consisting of relationships between structures we create rather than of objective realities. The Age of Structuralism examines the work of seven writers who either expanded upon or reacted against Levi-Strauss.In a panoramic overview of the origins of deconstructionism and its critics, Edith Kurzweil offers a lucid and penetrating portrait of the movement that dominated French intellectual life for much of the postwar era, and which continues to influence the French intellectual milieu. She explains Levi-Strauss's strikingly original contributions, then proceeds to illuminate the ideas of crusaders and critics. The key figures dealt with include: Louis Althusser, who reinterpreted Marxism through a rereading of Marx's texts with the help of structuralist techniques; Henri Lefebvre, who remained faithful to Marx's humanism and was one of the earliest and most vehement critics of structuralism; Paul Ricoeur, whose phenomenology sought to reconcile ethical theory and intellectual pursuits; Alain Touraine, a socialist whose sociology of political action led him to dismiss structuralist concerns; Jacques Lacan, who criticized ego-oriented psychoanalytic theory and practice, and whose own work emphasized linguistic structures in psychoanalysis; Roland Barthes, whose literary criticism, in its determination to reject all false notions and systems, led to a highly idiosyncratic approach that drew upon all systems; and finally, Michel Foucault, whose social histories of deviance, medicine, psychology, grammar, language, sexuality criminology, have reexamined every facet of social theory.Placing these major figures in the context of political, historical, and psychoanalytic currents of the time, The Age of Structuralism is a commanding and far-reaching study of a decisive epoch in intellectual history. Kurzweil's new opening essay explains how these towering figures prefigured current emphasis on semiotics, post-structuralism, deconstruction, and post-postmodernism. Kurt H. Wolff called it "lucid, splendid and unobtrusive" when the book first appeared. It remains a central work in the appreciation of the French giants upon whose shoulders the new crop of thinkers expect to stand.
The Age of Supported Independence
by Beatrice Hale Robin Gauld Patrick BarrettThis book investigates the experiences of older people who remain at home with care. It examines the transition points for the important life changes faced by family members who take on a greater care-giving role. The book draws on demographic analyses and qualitative fieldwork to explore the shift from independence to increasing dependence, and suggests that this transition constitutes movement into a new stage of life, that of an Age of Supported Independence. Applying the anthropological concept of rites of passage in their analysis, the authors focus on the changes in everyday living within the spatial environment of the home, the temporal organization of daily life, and the reshaping of relationships. They suggest that many older people - as well as the family members who become carers - remain in a state of 'liminality': unable to make sense of their new situation and experience and, despite assumptions that ageing-in-place sustains social connectedness, excluded from their communities.
The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power
by Shoshana ZuboffThe challenges to humanity posed by the digital future, the first detailed examination of the unprecedented form of power called "surveillance capitalism," and the quest by powerful corporations to predict and control our behavior. <P><P>Shoshana Zuboff's interdisciplinary breadth and depth enable her to come to grips with the social, political, business, and technological meaning of the changes taking place in our time. We are at a critical juncture in the confrontation between the vast power of giant high-tech companies and government, the hidden economic logic of surveillance capitalism, and the propaganda of machine supremacy that threaten to shape and control human life. <P><P>Will the brazen new methods of social engineering and behavior modification threaten individual autonomy and democratic rights and introduce extreme new forms of social inequality? Or will the promise of the digital age be one of individual empowerment and democratization? <P><P>The Age of Surveillance Capitalism is neither a hand-wringing narrative of danger and decline nor a digital fairy tale. Rather, it offers a deeply reasoned and evocative examination of the contests over the next chapter of capitalism that will decide the meaning of information civilization in the twenty-first century. The stark issue at hand is whether we will be the masters of information and machines or its slaves.
The Age of Television
by Martin EsslinHaving spent most of his career working with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Martin Esslin appraises American TV with the eyes of both a detached outsider and a concerned insider. "American popular culture," writes Esslin, "has become the popular culture of the world at large. American television is thus more than a purely social phenomenon. It fascinates and in some instances frightens the whole world." The Age of Television discusses television as an essentially dramatic form of communication, pointing to the strengths and weaknesses that spring from its character. It explores its impact on generations destined to grow up under its influence, with such questions as how TV turns reality into fiction, and fiction into reality. Esslin considers the long-term effects of television on our abilities to reason, to read, to create. He asks if current programming on American television constitutes what we want and deserve, and asks what we would change, if we could. These are but a handful of the questions Esslin probes in this penetrating analysis of contemporary television and its impact on our lives. In his new introduction, Esslin discusses changes in the media over the last two decades. He explores the increasing number of television stations available, the rise of "boutique" channels concentrating on news, sports, or film, and the relationship between television and other forms of electronic media such as video games and the Internet. Finally, he considers the effect of these developments on our ability to concentrate, our sensitivity to violence, and even our artistic taste. Most compelling of all is his final question: Can the Age of Television, with all its dangers, yet become a golden age of cultural growth? Martin Esslin is professor emeritus of drama at Stanford University. His numerous critical works include: Brecht-The Man and his Work, The Theatre of the Absurd, An Anatomy of Drama, and Artaud. He cur
Age of the Geek: Depictions of Nerds and Geeks in Popular Media
by Kathryn E. LaneThis collection examines the nerd and/or geek stereotype in popular culture today. Utilizing the media--film, TV, YouTube, Twitter, fiction--that often defines daily lives, the contributors interrogate what it means to be labeled a "nerd" or "geek. " While the nerd/geek that is so easily recognized now is assuredly a twenty-first century construct, an examination of the terms' history brings a greater understanding of their evolution. From sports to slasher films, Age of the Geek establishes a dialogue with texts as varied as the depictions of "nerd" or "geek" stereotypes.
The Age of the Infovore: Succeeding in the Information Economy
by Tyler Cowen"Will change the way you think about thinking. " -Daniel H. Pink, author of A Whole New Mind Renowned behavioral economist and commentator Tyler Cowen shows that our supernetworked world is changing the way we think-and empowering us to thrive in any economic climate. Whether it is micro-blogging on Twitter or buying single songs at iTunes, we can now customize our lives to shape our own specific needs. In other words, we can create our own economy-and live smarter, happier, fuller lives. At a time when apocalyptic thinking has become all too common, Cowen offers a much- needed information age manifesto that will resonate with readers of Dan Ariely's Predictably Irrational, Steven Johnson's Everything Bad is Good for You, and everyone hungry to understand our potential to withstand, and even thrive, in any economic climate. .
The Age of the Inquiry: Learning and Blaming in Health and Social Care
by Nicky Stanley Jill ManthorpeThe plethora of inquiry reports published in the fields of health and welfare in the 1990s covered the full range of user groups, individuals and institutions. What similarities or differences were there between these inquiries? How effective were they in bringing about change? Whose interest did they best serve?These are some of the questions The Age of the Inquiry explores in detail, bringing together distinguished contributors with personal experience of chairing or providing evidence to inquiries to consider: the participant's view of inquiriesthe purpose of inquiriesthe impact of inquiries on health and social policyinquiries into: child abuse and death; homicides by mental health service users; the abuse of adults with learning disabilities; the abuse of older people. Wide-ranging in scope, The Age of the Inquiry focuses on service and policy development. It provides an invaluable text for students, teachers and professionals from a wide range of disciplines and professional groups.
The Age of the Moguls
by Stewart HolbrookVanderbilt, Carnegie, Rockefeller, Ford, Drew, Fisk, Harriman, Du Pont, Morgan, Mellon, Insull, Gould, Frick, Schwab, Swift, Guggenheim, Hearst- these are only a few of the foundation giants that have changed the face of America. They gave living reality to that great golden legend-The American Dream. Most were self-made in the Horatio Alger tradition. Those whose beginnings were blessed with wealth parlayed their inheritances many times through the same methods as their rags-to-riches compatriots: shrewdness, ruthlessness, determination, or a combination of all three.The Age of the Moguls is not overly concerned with the comparative business ethics of these men of money. The best of them made "deals," purchased immunity, and did other things which in 1860, 1880, or even 1900, were considered no more than "smart" by their fellow Americans, but which today would give pause to the most conscientiously dishonest promoter. Holbrook does not pass judgments on matters that have baffled moralists, economists, and historians. He is less concerned with how these men achieved their fortune as much as how they disbursed the funds.Stewart Holbrook has written a brilliant and wholly captivating study of the days when America's great fortunes were built; when futures were unlimited; when tycoons trampled across the land. Few writers today could range backwards and forwards in American history through the last century and a half, and could take their readers to a dozen different sections of the country, or combine the lives of over fifty famous men in such a way as to produce a continuous and exciting narrative of sponsored growth. Leslie Lenkowsky's new introduction adds dimension to this classic study.
The Age of the Social: The Discovery of Society and The Ascendance of a New Episteme
by Sal RestivoThe concept of society sui generis – society as a level of reality which could be studied scientifically – crystallized in the middle of the nineteenth century in Europe, with the work of Durkheim, Marx and Weber and today, more than at any other period in history, the idea of the social has gained a foothold in philosophy, biology, and neuroscience. However, this idea has emerged into prominence not through the historical or contemporary efforts of sociologists, but mainly through the efforts of biologists and neuroscientists. This book seeks to re-establish the credentials of sociology as the science of society. While acknowledging the amalgamation of traditional disciplines into interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary networks of research and theory, and championing interdisciplinarity in recognising the capacity of converging perspectives to yield more interesting general theories of social life, the author defends disciplinarity in maintaining sociology’s achievements as a discipline. With chapters on the sociological world view, imagining society, the self, love, education, mathematics and religion, The Age of the Social re-states the importance of sociology as the source of robust ideas about the social in an age in which this notion has grown in importance. As such, it will appeal to scholars across the social sciences, with interests in method and philosophy in the social disciplines.
The Age of the Warrior: Selected Essays by Robert Fisk
by Robert FiskRobert Fisk has amassed a massive and devoted global readership with his eloquent and far-ranging articles on international politics. Now, for the first time, his brave and incisive essays have been collected in a single volume that ranges in scope from the recent war in Lebanon to the rise of Hamas; from the invasion of Kuwait to the looting of Baghdad; from America's imperial ambitions to the inescapable influence of the Treaty of Versailles. Taken together, these articles form an unparalleled account of our war-torn recent history.
The Age of Violence: The Crisis of Political Action and the End of Utopia
by Alain BerthoExploring the fury of the young in a world or crisis that seems to offer no alternatives"Only martyrs know neither pity nor fear. Believe me, the day when the martyrs are victorious will be the day of universal conflagration". Jacques Lacan made this gloomy prophesy back in 1959: but doesn't it also apply to our own time? Faced with a rise in attacks around the world, can we really just blame the 'radicalization of' Islam'? What hope is there for the alienated youth, as the wars that have ravaged the Middle East spill out across the globe?For Alain Bertho, the mounting chaos we see today is above all driven by the weakening of states' legitimacy under the pressure of globalization. Add to this the hypocrisy of the elites who beat the drum of 'security measures', even as they sow the seeds of violence around the world. This disorder is the swamp of despair which can only produce fresh atrocities.Today's youth are the lost children of neoliberal globalization, the inheritors of the political and human chaos it produces. When they find it easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism, their revolt tends to take the paths of martyrdom and despair. The closing of the revolutionary hypothesis allows only fury. The answer, Bertho argues, is a new radicalism, able to inspire a collective hope in the future.
The Age of Wood: Our Most Useful Material and the Construction of Civilization
by Roland EnnosA &“smart and surprising&” (Booklist) &“expansive history&” (Publishers Weekly) detailing the role that wood and trees have played in our global ecosystem—including human evolution and the rise and fall of empires—in the bestselling tradition of Yuval Harari&’s Sapiens and Mark Kurlansky&’s Salt.As the dominant species on Earth, humans have made astonishing progress since our ancestors came down from the trees. But how did the descendants of small primates manage to walk upright, become top predators, and populate the world? How were humans able to develop civilizations and produce a globalized economy? Now, in The Age of Wood, Roland Ennos shows for the first time that the key to our success has been our relationship with wood. &“A lively history of biology, mechanics, and culture that stretches back 60 million years&” (Nature) The Age of Wood reinterprets human history and shows how our ability to exploit wood&’s unique properties has profoundly shaped our bodies and minds, societies, and lives. Ennos takes us on a sweeping journey from Southeast Asia and West Africa where great apes swing among the trees, build nests, and fashion tools; to East Africa where hunter gatherers collected their food; to the structural design of wooden temples in China and Japan; and to Northern England, where archaeologists trace how coal enabled humans to build an industrial world. Addressing the effects of industrialization—including the use of fossil fuels and other energy-intensive materials to replace timber—The Age of Wood not only shows the essential role that trees play in the history and evolution of human existence, but also argues that for the benefit of our planet we must return to more traditional ways of growing, using, and understanding trees. A brilliant blend of recent research and existing scientific knowledge, this is an &“excellent, thorough history in an age of our increasingly fraught relationships with natural resources&” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review).
The Age of Youth in Argentina
by Valeria ManzanoThis social and cultural history of Argentina's "long sixties" argues that the nation's younger generation was at the epicenter of a public struggle over democracy, authoritarianism, and revolution from the mid-twentieth century through the ruthless military dictatorship that seized power in 1976. Valeria Manzano demonstrates how, during this period, large numbers of youths built on their history of earlier activism and pushed forward closely linked agendas of sociocultural modernization and political radicalization.Focusing also on the views of adults who assessed, and sometimes profited from, youth culture, Manzano analyzes countercultural formations--including rock music, sexuality, student life, and communal living experiences--and situates them in an international context. She details how, while Argentines of all ages yearned for newness and change, it was young people who championed the transformation of deep-seated traditions of social, cultural, and political life. The significance of youth was not lost on the leaders of the rising junta: people aged sixteen to thirty accounted for 70 percent of the estimated 20,000 Argentines who were "disappeared" during the regime.
Age, Period and Cohort Effects: Statistical Analysis and the Identification Problem
by Andrew BellAge, Period and Cohort Effects: Statistical Analysis and the Identification Problem gives a number of perspectives from top methodologists and applied researchers on the best ways to attempt to answer Age–Period–Cohort related questions about society. Age–Period–Cohort (APC) analysis is a fundamental topic for any quantitative social scientist studying individuals over time. At the same time, it is also one of the most misunderstood and underestimated topics in quantitative methods. As such, this book is key reference material for researchers wanting to know how to deal with APC issues appropriately in their statistical modelling. It deals with the identification problem caused by the co-linearity of the three variables, considers why some currently used methods are problematic and suggests ideas for what applied researchers interested in APC analysis should do. Whilst the perspectives are varied, the book provides a unified view of the subject in a reader-friendly way that will be accessible to social scientists with a moderate level of quantitative understanding, across the social and health sciences.
Age Power: How the 21st Century Will Be Ruled By the New Old
by Ken DychtwaldIn this breakthrough book, Dychtwald explains how individuals, businesses, and governments can best prepare for a new era in which the priorities of our homes and nation will be set by the needs and desires of the elderly. He surveys how each of us must make individual decisions right now to "age-proof" our lives.
Age-Structured Population Dynamics in Demography and Epidemiology
by Hisashi InabaThis book is the first one in which basic demographic models are rigorously formulated by using modern age-structured population dynamics, extended to study real-world population problems. Age structure is a crucial factor in understanding population phenomena, and the essential ideas in demography and epidemiology cannot be understood without mathematical formulation; therefore, this book gives readers a robust mathematical introduction to human population studies. In the first part of the volume, classical demographic models such as the stable population model and its linear extensions, density-dependent nonlinear models, and pair-formation models are formulated by the McKendrick partial differential equation and are analyzed from a dynamical system point of view. In the second part, mathematical models for infectious diseases spreading at the population level are examined by using nonlinear differential equations and a renewal equation. Since an epidemic can be seen as a nonlinear renewal process of an infected population, this book will provide a natural unification point of view for demography and epidemiology. The well-known epidemic threshold principle is formulated by the basic reproduction number, which is also a most important key index in demography. The author develops a universal theory of the basic reproduction number in heterogeneous environments. By introducing the host age structure, epidemic models are developed into more realistic demographic formulations, which are essentially needed to attack urgent epidemiological control problems in the real world.
The Age-Well Project: Easy Ways to a Longer, Healthier, Happier Life
by Susan Saunders Annabel Streets'The essential mid-life mum makeover. From fitness to sleep and even your social life, a brilliant new book by two 50-something mothers reveals how to protect your health and happiness' Daily Mail'Educational and informative' Woman's WayAn essential handbook for making the second half of your life happy, healthy and disease-free.Diseases of older age take root decades before symptoms appear. For a longer, happier life, we need to plan ahead - but what exactly should we do?For five years, Annabel Streets and Susan Saunders immersed themselves in the latest science of longevity, radically overhauling their lives and documenting their findings on their popular blog.After reading hundreds of studies and talking to numerous experts, Annabel and Susan have compiled almost 100 short cuts to health in mid and later life, including: how, when and what to eat; the supplements worth taking; when, where and how to exercise; the most useful medical tests; how to avoid health-threatening chemicals; the best methods for keeping the brain sharp; and how to sleep better.
The Age-Well Project: Easy Ways to a Longer, Healthier, Happier Life
by Annabel Streets Susan Saunders'The essential mid-life mum makeover. From fitness to sleep and even your social life, a brilliant new book by two 50-something mothers reveals how to protect your health and happiness' Daily Mail'Educational and informative' Woman's WayDiseases of older age take root decades before symptoms appear. For a longer, happier life, we need to plan ahead - but what exactly should we do?For five years, Annabel Streets and Susan Saunders immersed themselves in the latest science of longevity, radically overhauling their lives and documenting their findings on their popular blog.After reading hundreds of studies and talking to numerous experts, Annabel and Susan have compiled almost 100 short cuts to health in mid and later life, including: how, when and what to eat; the supplements worth taking; when, where and how to exercise; the most useful medical tests; how to avoid health-threatening chemicals; the best methods for keeping the brain sharp; and how to sleep better.The Age-Well Project is an essential handbook for making the second half of your life happy, healthy and disease-free.
Ageing: Recent Advances and Creative Responses (Routledge Library Editions: Aging)
by Alan ButlerOriginally published in 1985, Ageing: Recent Advances and Creative Responses contains a selection of the papers contributed to the British Society of Gerontology Annual Conference, held in Leeds in September 1984. The book examines some of the positive and innovative multi-disciplinary work which is going on in the field of human ageing, placing particular emphasis on issues such as: the use of leisure in later life; association and friendship; innovations in the funding of services; the political and social views of older people themselves; the importance of an adequate income and appropriate housing; the psychologist’s role in prevention and early detection of disorders, and work in the community.The book will be of value to all academics, policy makers and practitioners with an interest in human ageing and later life, the health and social difficulties encountered by this age group, and the positive responses that can be made by both the providers of services and the elderly themselves.
Ageing: Lessons from C. elegans (Healthy Ageing and Longevity #5)
by Anders Olsen Matthew S. GillThis book brings together in one volume the current state of ageing research in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. The authors are leading researchers in the field, placing this topic in the context of human ageing, describing how and why basic discoveries in this simple organism have impacted our prospects for intervention in the ageing process. The authors cover a broad range of topics with regards to organismal and reproductive ageing including anatomical, physiological and biochemical changes, as well as genetic and environmental interventions that promote longevity and ameliorate age-related disease. Ageing is the single most important factor determining the onset of human disease in developed countries. With current worldwide demographic trends indicating that the number of individuals over the age of 65 will continue to rise, it is clear that an understanding of the processes that underpin ageing and age-related disease represents a key challenge in the biomedical sciences. In recent years there have been huge advances in our understanding of the ageing process and many of these have stemmed from genetic analysis of C. elegans. With no analogous book in this subject area this work will be of interest to a wide audience, ranging from academic researchers to the general public.
Ageing and Contemporary Female Musicians (Interdisciplinary Research in Gender)
by Abigail GardnerAgeing and Contemporary Female Musicians focuses on ageing within contemporary popular music. It argues that context, genres, memoirs, racial politics and place all contribute to how women are 'aged' in popular music. Framing contemporary female musicians as canonical grandmothers, Rude Girls, neo-Afrofuturist and memoirists settling accounts, the book gives us some respite from a decline or denial narrative and introduces a dynamism into ageing. Female rock memoirs are age-appropriate survival stories that reframe the histories of punk and independent rock music. Old age has a functional and canonical ‘place’ in the work of Shirley Collins and Calypso Rose. Janelle Monáe, Christine and the Queens and Anohni perform ‘queer’ age, specifically a kind of ‘going beyond’ both corporeal and temporal borders. Genres age, and the book introduces the idea of the time-crunch; an encounter between an embodied, represented age and a genre-age, which is, itself, produced through historicity and aesthetics. Lastly the book goes behind the scenes to draw on interviews and questionnaires with 19 women involved in the contemporary British and American popular music industry; DIY and ex-musicians, producers, music publishers, music journalists and audio engineers. Ageing and Contemporary Female Musicians is a vital intergenerational feminist viewpoint for researchers and students in gender studies, popular music, popular culture, media studies, cultural studies and ageing studies.
Ageing and Covid-19: Making Sense of a Disrupted World (Social Perspectives on Ageing and Later Life)
by Maria ŁuszczyńskaThis volume presents a range of research approaches to the exploration of ageing during a pandemic situation. One of the first collections of its kind, it offers an array of studies employing research methodologies that lend themselves to replication in similar contexts by those seeking to understand the effects of epidemics on older people. Thematically organised, it shows how to reconcile qualitative and quantitative approaches, thus rendering them complementary, bringing together studies from around the world to offer an international perspective on ageing as it relates to an unprecedented epidemiological phenomenon. As such, it will appeal to researchers in the field of gerontology, as well as sociologists of medicine and clinicians seeking to understand the disruptive effects of the recent coronavirus outbreak on later life.
Ageing and Digital Technology: Designing and Evaluating Emerging Technologies for Older Adults
by Barbara Barbosa Neves Frank VetereThis book brings together Sociologists, Computer Scientists, Applied Scientists and Engineers to explore the design, implementation and evaluation of emerging technologies for older people. It offers an innovative and comprehensive overview, not only of the rapidly developing suite of current digital technologies and platforms, but also of perennial theoretical, methodological and ethical issues. As such, it offers support for researchers and professionals who are seeking to understand and/or promote technology use among older adults. The contributions presented here offer theoretical and methodological frameworks for understanding age-based digital inequalities, participation, digital design and socio-gerontechnology. They include ethical and practical reflections on the design and evaluation of emerging technologies for older people, as well as guidelines for ethical, participatory, professional and cross-disciplinary research and practice. In addition, they feature state-of-the-art, international empirical research on communication technologies, games, assistive technology and social media. As the first truly multidisciplinary book on technology use among ageing demographics, and intended for students, researchers, applied researchers, practitioners and professionals in a variety of fields, it will provide these readers with insights, guidelines and paradigms for practice that transcend specific technologies, and lay the groundwork for future research and new directions in innovation.
Ageing and Families: A Support Networks Perspective (Routledge Library Editions: Family)
by Hal L. KendigOriginally published in 1986, this title was a landmark study of ageing in Australia and a major contribution to the study of gerontology at the time. It highlights major themes on ageing in ‘western’ industrialised societies, as well as pinpointing new, emerging themes. For instance, the initial speculations in the 1960s that informal groups such as the family, neighbours, and friends play crucial helping roles for older people. The book also presents data and summarises past studies that show the common characteristics of those delivering and receiving services, such as the special role of women; and within that gender related services, the special importance of children and spouses, the importance of close proximity when people are chronically disabled, the fact that most retired people manage their own lives without help and in fact provide services to their children, and much more, is dealt with. It also looks at how such informal support works alongside the formal agencies, such as nursing homes. The systematic study of how informal and formal systems link together was one of the gaps in gerontological research at the time.