Aging Well: A Case Study
Added on 2020-04-15
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Running age: SOCIAL THEORIESSOCIAL THEORIESName of the student:Name of the universities:Author note:
1SOCIAL THEORIESAge can never be considered merely as a number. This is because it represents a hugewealth of life experiences which shapes a person that one becomes. In the present generation,with the advancement of the medical science, prolonging life has become possible. Old age isnow seen with different perspectives in present genration as providing high quality medical carehas been possible. In spite of these, sociologists are of the opinion that various aspects of healthyaging experiences depend on the social class, gender, race as well as other social factors (Novak,2013). Many media portrayals of the elderly reflect negative cultural beliefs and attitudestowards aging. Society tends to glorify youth associating with beauty and sexuality. In comediesas well, old age is represented with hostility and grumpiness. Many stereotypes exist surroundingthe realities about the elderly and aging people (George & Ferraro, 2016). Often people are seento encounter stereotypes associated with race and gender and therefore they tend to think morecritically about them. Each culture has their own set of expectations and assumptions about agingand all these are part of the socialization (Mortimer & Moen, 2016). This assignment will mainlydescribe the life history procedures about an old man which will reflect his different stages ofaging. It will inevitably reflect the social theory of paradigm that aligns with his agingprocedures and will help to give and insight how aging an individual can affect his mental andphysical health.The person whose interview was taken was a cheerful old man whose name was Samuel Okonwho was from Nigeria. He had lived a happy and contented life. He lived a small village withvery few local inhabitants. He had a loving family where he used to respect his parents a lot andused to follow their advices. He had given up his wished of becoming a military man as hisfather was not in support of the decision. He had faced minor issues in his teenage year’s as hislikes and dislikes and idea of freedom cashed with his parents but he took it never in a negative
2SOCIAL THEORIESsense. He adored and respected his father a lot mainly because of the values and the principlefollowed in his life. He had stated that although they were not economically very rich but washappy and satisfied with the little amount of money that his father earned by farming. They usedto have social gatherings in the local festivals of his village where people form town also came.This stated that there no was no conflict of power between the urban and rural people. Hi marriedlife was also happier although he stated that both of them had compromised a lot and hadrespected each other’s liking and disliking making a stable relationship. He had never liked hisfriends having two to three wives but he was always a man of good principles where hi mainfocus was good living, happy family and trust on god. He had never repented or blamed hisfather for making him an engineer. Rather he had settled that he had loved his professor andworked property throughout his life.The symbolic integrationist perspectives also known as symbolic interactionism mainly directthe sociologists to consider different types of symbols and details of everyday lives. It also showswhat these symbols signify and how people interact with each other. According to symbolistintegrationist perspective, people attach their meanings to symbols and they perform accordingto the subjective interactions of these symbols (Dannefer, Kellet-moore & Huang, 2016).Theories concerning symbolist interactionism perspective mainly is based on the fact that howsociety is created with the help of day to day interaction of the individuals. It also remains basedon the fact of the different ways people perceive themselves and other based on different types ofcultural symbols (Settersen & Hagstead, 2015). Researchers are of the opinion that microanalytic perspective says that if people develop a sense of identity through different forms ofsocial interactions, their sense of self is dependent on those interactions. This can be explainedby an example. A woman whose interactions with the society makes her feel old and unattractive
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