The Evening of Life: The Challenges of Aging and Dying Well

Joseph E. Davis

ISBN 10: 0268108021 / ISBN 13: 9780268108021

Published by University of Notre Dame Press, 2020

New copy - Usually dispatched within 4 working days. Seller Inventory # B9780268108021

Synopsis:

Although philosophy, religion, and civic cultures used to help people prepare for aging and dying well, this is no longer the case. Today, aging is frequently seen as a problem to be solved and death as a harsh reality to be masked. In part, our cultural confusion is rooted in an inadequate conception of the human person, which is based on a notion of absolute individual autonomy that cannot but fail in the face of the dependency that comes with aging and decline at the end of life. To help correct the ethical impoverishment at the root of our contemporary social confusion, The Evening of Life provides an interdisciplinary examination of the challenges of aging and dying well. It calls for a re-envisioning of cultural concepts, practices, and virtues that embraces decline, dependency, and finitude rather than stigmatizes them. Bringing together the work of sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers, theologians, and medical practitioners, this collection of essays develops an interrelated set of conceptual tools to discuss the current challenges posed to aging and dying well, such as flourishing, temporality, narrative, and friendship. Above all, it proposes a positive understanding of thriving in old age that is rooted in our shared vulnerability as human beings. It also suggests how some of these tools and concepts can be deployed to create a medical system that better responds to our contemporary needs. The Evening of Life will interest bioethicists, medical practitioners, clinicians, and others involved in the care of the aging and dying.

Contributors: Joseph E. Davis, Sharon R. Kaufman, Paul Scherz, Wilfred M. McClay, Kevin Aho, Charles Guignon, Bryan S. Turner, Janelle S. Taylor, Sarah L. Szanton, Janiece Taylor, and Justin Mutter

About the Authors:

Joseph E. Davis is research professor of sociology at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia. He is the author, most recently, of Chemically Imbalanced: Everyday Suffering, Medication, and Our Troubled Quest for Self-Mastery.

Paul Scherz is the Our Lady of Guadalupe Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author and editor of several books, including The Evening of Life: The Challenges of Aging and Dying Well.

Bibliographic Details

Title: The Evening of Life: The Challenges of Aging...
Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press
Publication Date: 2020
Binding: Paperback / softback
Condition: New