A different life?: Barthes,Foucault and everyday life

How might the injunction to ‘think differently’ in the work of French theorists Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault have informed a re-thinking of everyday life? In Barthes’ work, a critical analysis of myth and ideology in the contemporary everyday life of the late 1950s gives way to counter-ideological strategies that might seem to move away from the everyday and towards the utopian. However, the utopian imagination at work in Barthes’ thought is effective precisely in its insistence on the everyday detail. This is reflected in the later work in the attention given to the incident and the haiku. In his later work, Foucault turns towards antiquity in response to his own assessment of the ubiquitous diffusion of relations of power and the need to ‘think differently’. It is, however, in the interviews and specifically in a series of comments on homosexuality that Foucault is most attentive to the ‘possibilities for new life’ in his own time. It is through the undoing of already established relations and the experimentation with different modes of relation that a locus of difference can be found in everyday life. This is characterized by Foucault as a heterotopia. Foucault’s tentative suggestions of different possibilities are oriented towards an intensification of pleasures, counter to the psychoanalytic attention to desire. However, Foucault’s account of pleasure is associated with mortality, suggesting the question: is this different life one destined only to posterity and its own transcendence? Deleuze’s reading of Foucauldian subjectivation suggests a different strategy of resistance, more attuned to the immanence of a life.     

Optimum taxation of life annuities

The market for private life annuities is characterised by adverse selection; that is, contracts offer lower than fair payoffs to individuals with low life expectancy. Moreover, longevity and income have been found to be positively correlated. We formulate an optimum income taxation model that incorporates these facts and discuss the conditions under which a linear tax on annuity payoffs, which raises more revenues from long-living individuals than from short-living, can serve as an instrument for redistribution. Further, we consider a nonlinear tax on annuity payoffs, and find that it can be employed to correct the distortion of the rate of return caused by asymmetric information.     

Testosterone and men's quality of life

As the worldwide population ages, the emphasis on having a reasonable quality of life in old-age is increasing. In men, age-associated testosterone decline is one of the major factors that reduce quality of life. In patients and the physicians treating them, decreased energy levels and impairments to sex-life are perceived as the most important effects of hypogonadism. Two quality of life scales, the Aging Males' Symptoms (AMS) and the Age-Related Hormone Deficiency-Dependent Quality of Life (A-RHDQoL) scales, have recently been developed to specifically assess this patient population, and the A-RHDQoL found that memory, energy and physical capabilities, and sex-life were the factors most adversely affected by low testosterone levels. Unfortunately, there are limited data on the effects of testosterone on the quality of life of men with hypogonadism, but the information that exists suggests that testosterone can improve the quality of life significantly (to the same level as men with normal testosterone levels) and the more severe the symptoms before treatment, the greater the benefits of testosterone replacement. These promising early results need to be confirmed in more detailed quality of life studies.     

The experience of quality of life among older people

Although quality of life has been in the focus of attention for over a decade there are few studies available investigating, how the old and the oldest old experience their quality of life or what quality of life actually means for them? To illuminate this, eleven in-depth interviews were conducted with six women and five men (80+) living in their home. An interpretative hermeneutic phenomenological analysis revealed that quality of life in old age meant a preserved self and meaning in existence. Maintained self-image meant that the older people experienced a coherent life with an intact meaning. How quality of life was valued depended on the meaning the old people attached to the areas of importance as well as how they were evaluated. Additionally, areas not generally included when measuring quality of life became discernible. The meaning of home, how life was viewed, thoughts about death and dying, and telling ones story proved to be areas of importance for their perception of quality of life. Thus, indicating that older people's view of quality of life is more complex than some of today's most commonly used quality of life instruments capture and that quality of life assessment tools needs to measure beyond pure health indices. For nursing care the use of life review in everyday care, and an open way towards existential topics as well as a family oriented care along with preventive work helping people to remain in their own homes may enhance their experience of quality of life.     

Obesity over the life course

Obesity in middle-aged humans is a risk factor for many age-related diseases and decreases life expectancy by about 7 years, which is roughly comparable to the combined effect of all cardiovascular disease and cancer on life span. The prevalence of obesity increases up until late middle age and decreases thereafter. Mechanisms that lead to increased obesity with age are not yet well understood, but current evidence implicates impairments in hypothalamic function, especially impairments in the ability of hypothalamic pro-opiomelanocortin neurons to sense nutritional signals. The rapid increase in the prevalence of obesity at all ages in the past decade suggests that, in the next two or three decades, diseases associated with obesity, especially diabetes, will begin to rise rapidly. Indeed, these trends suggest that for the first time in modern history, the life expectancy of people in developed societies will begin to decrease, unless the rapid increase in the prevalence of obesity can be reversed.     

Marketing and the quality of life

This article explores the relationship between marketing and quality of life.The first part develops a conceptualization of quality of life based on the idea that citizens arc involved in exchanging resources to new resources or to ultimate satisfaction in a set of arenas of action. The so-called objective and subjective approaches to measuring quality of life address different aspects of the exchange relationships and their context.The article claims that marketing at least indirectly has contributed to a higher quality of life by rendering work life possible and by providing the goods and services entering the consuming life arena. At the same time, marketing has had a negative influence by giving priority to short-term, materialistic needs. Necessary institutional changes in marketing are indicated.     

The social life of images

This paper presents a theoretical and methodological approach to analysing images in public space as part of a transformative visual dialogue in everyday life. Images are conceptualised through the lens of sociocultural psychology and analytically approached through the metaphor of ‘the social life of images,’ by which the life cycle of images is followed as they respond and borrow from one another in a continuous dialogue. The analytical framework starts by situating the image and identifying its spatial and temporal contexts. Then, it considers the social actors influencing the image’s social life and the different stages in an image’s trajectory. Leading to an analysis of the political dynamics of an image and its potential symbolic power to influence the public discourse. Examples from street art, online, and news images will be used to illustrate the analytical approach.     

The body without organs: nonorganizational desire in organizational life

In an attempt to challenge the status of the organizational, this paper proposes a ‘nonorganizational’ turn towards embodiment and desire. Introducing and critically discussing Deleuze and Guattari's () notion of the ‘body without organs’ (BwO), it argues that this may improve organization theory's opportunities to think about the forces of embodied desire that disrupt, undermine and escape organization, upset the homogeneity of organizational life, and overpower organizations to such an extent that they cease to be organizations. Rather than adding more ‘organization’ to ‘organizational life’, this may be a way to put more ‘life’ into it. And rather than deeming organization more powerful, this may be a way to recognize its limitations and fragility.     

The time and space of everyday life

This article argues that everyday life is related to all social relations and activities, including both the ‘official’ practices that are codified and normalized and the ‘unofficial’ practices and articulations of experience. Indeed, everyday day life is seen as the single plane of immanence in which these two forms of practice and articulation interrelate and affect one another. The lived experience of everyday life is multidimensional, composed of various social fields of practice that are articulated, codified and normalized to different degrees and in different ways (either officially or unofficially). Moving through these fields in daily life, we are aware of passing through different zones of time and space. There are aspects of everyday relations and practices more open to government, institutionalization, and official codification, while others are more resistant and provide the basis for opposition and social movements. Everyday life is a mixture of diverse and differentially produced and articulated forms, each combining time and space in a unique way. What we refer to as ‘institutions’ associated with the state or the economy are attempts to fix social practice in time and space – to contain it in specific geographical sites and codify it in official discourses. The relations and practices more often associated with everyday life – such as friendship, love, comradeship and relations of communication – are more fluid, open and dispersed across time and space. However, the two should not be uncoupled in social analysis, as they are necessarily interrelated in processes of social and political change. This is especially so in contemporary capitalism or, as Lefebvre called it, the ‘bureaucratic society of controlled consumption’.     

Sex-specific effects of interventions that extend fly life span

Genetic and environmental interventions that extend life span are a current focus in research on the biology of aging. Most of this work has focused on differences among genotypes and species. A recent study on fruit flies shows that life span extension because of dietary restriction can be highly sex-specific. Here we review the literature on sex-specific effects of 56 genetic and 41 environmental interventions that extend life span in Drosophila melanogaster. We found that only one-sixth of the experiments provided statistical tests of differences in response between males and females, suggesting that sex-specific effects have been largely ignored. When measured, the life span extension was female-biased in 8 of 16 cases, male-biased in 5 of 16 cases, and not significantly different in only 3 of 16 cases. We discuss possible explanations for the sex-specific differences and suggest various ways in which we might test these hypotheses. We argue that understanding sex differences in the response to life span-extending manipulations should lead to new insights about the basic mechanisms that underlie the biology of aging in both sexes.     

The premium of inflation-indexed life insurances for the Romanian life table

This paper deals with the pricing process of life insurances that provide an insured sum indexed annually according to the current inflation rate. In these terms we propose an appropriate formula for the discount factor. In order to describe the inflation, we consider a stochastic autoregressive model. We deduce analytical expressions for the mean value and the variance of random variable defined as the present value of 1 unit indexed annually according to the inflation rate, payable over t years, when inflation is generated by an autoregressive process of order one. At the same time, we obtain numerical results for the Romanian life table, regarding the mean and the standard deviation for the actuarial present value of a pure endowment life insurance with the sum insured indexed annually with the inflation rate.     

Dimensions of life satisfaction: Immigrant and ethnic minorities

The article investigates the dimensions of life satisfaction of immigrant and ethnic minorities comparing them with the majority population. It constructs a theoretical framework, taking into account both pecuniary and non‐pecuniary dimensions of welfare. This study is based on the data of the Social Survey, administered by the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics. Immigrants in this study are regarded as a migrant minority and Israeli‐born Arab citizens as an ethnic minority. The results reveal significant life satisfaction gaps between the groups, which can be partially explained by the value of work per se and the value of leisure activities. Applying the Blinder‐Oaxaca decomposition technique, the study revealed that the gap in life satisfaction could be attributed both to the differences in pecuniary and non‐pecuniary resources for each group, and to different returns on resources. Policy targeted on increasing the economic possibilities of minority groups would decrease the life satisfaction gaps.     

Quality of life among lifetime victimized men

Quality of life was compared for lifetime victimized (n = 353) and nonvictimized men (n = 167) for demographic and quality of life variables by a cross-sectional design. The univariate analyses showed that victims compared to nonvictims had a lower quality of life, were younger, more often had upper secondary school education, and were more often blue-collar/low white-collar workers, on student allowances, on unemployment, financially strained, and smokers. The regressions revealed that unemployment, financial strain, smoking, depression, and home/public abuse were associated with reduced quality of life among victimized men. Being a blue-collar/low/intermediate white-collar worker and social support were related to increased quality of life. This study may have provided new insights into the experiences of quality of life of victimized men.     

Petrified life

How might we read temporality, that is, the psychical and social experience of time, as an index of the prevailing political and intersubjective impasses of the apartheid and post-apartheid eras? This paper explores three perspectives on this broad problematic. Achille Mbembe’s thoughts on repetition and nostalgia provide, firstly, a means of understanding one characteristically post-apartheid mode of temporality: that of suspended history. Crapanzano’s notion of waiting, elaborated as a means of grasping the white anxiety of the late apartheid period, allows us, secondly, to conceptualise the de-realised experience of a muted or deadened time. A third source, an unpublished text contributed to the Apartheid Archive concerning a fantasised scene of violence, enables us to sketch a third form of temporal experience common to apartheid and post-apartheid experiences alike, namely that of imagined retribution. These ostensibly separate and distinct modes of temporality can be read as interlocking forms of “petrified life,” a term I use to link temporalities of immobilisation characterised by suspension, stasis and fear.     

Homeless violence and the informal rules of street life

Successful adaptation to street life requires that risk of violence, an often present aspect of this lifestyle, be reduced to as low a level as possible. This means knowing the informal rules which permit avoiding the pitfalls of street life. It is argued in this paper that safety and security are a function of interactions occurring within a specific place, with particular associates, and involving safe and unsafe behavior. Carelessness with respect to any of these factors can result in victimization. These issues are discussed using survey and ethnographic data collected in Chattanooga.     

The temporal landscape of shoes: a life course perspective

This empirically grounded article draws on an ESRC‐funded project on footwear, identity and transition to offer new understandings of how a linear model of the life course may, in practice, be disrupted, subverted or reconfigured. Combining the insights of material culture and life course studies, it develops the notion of a temporal landscape of shoes within which their scope for interrupting life course temporalities can be explored. In particular, it identifies four temporal strategies made possible through the symbolic efficacy of footwear: the retrieval of an earlier identity through the purchase of styles previously worn; the deferral of later life by rejecting comfortable shoes that might symbolically reposition someone as ‘old’; the release of former age‐based identities and the embracing of freedom from a felt need to wear impractical or painful shoes; the appropriation or reconfiguring of the past as a contemporary resource through the wearing of vintage/hand‐me‐down shoes.     

Financial strain over the life course and health among older adults

This paper focuses on financial strain across the life course as a condition underlying health inequalities observed in later life. The analysis is based on data from 1167 adults 65 years and older collected as part of the 'Aging, Stress and Health Study". Relying on retrospective data about hardship experienced over the life course, we find that long-term financial hardship is reflected in a range of health outcomes at late life, even after controlling for the effects of current financial circumstances. Moreover, the sheer persistence of hardship matters more than its episodic occurrence or timing, so that the health effects of early hardship may be obviated if followed by no further hardship. This pattern offindings is consistent with the notion of allostatic load, the cumulative damage done to health and well-being under the burden of an unrelenting stressor in a critically important life domain.     

The life spiral

What is the relationship between the expression of human needs and the emergence of alternative adult roles? In this paper we criticize the assumptions of the life cycle model of adulthood as having only a limited repertoire of adult roles. We propose the life spiral model of adulthood to conceptualize the legitimation of alternative adult roles and the emergence of several patterns of adult life events. We present findings from interviews with 60 single adults with respect to the issues of intimacy and work to illustrate the differences between the cycle and the spiral models of adulthood.     

Family relationships,social support and subjective life expectancy

Do supportive personal relationships increase subjective life expectancy? The objective existence of family relationships and the subjective sense of having someone to call on in need may increase the length of life a person expects by creating assurance about the future, by reinforcing healthy habits, and by improving current health. Using the 1995 Aging, Status, and Sense of Control representative sample of 2,037 Americans ages 18-95, we find that having adult children and surviving parents increases the length of life one expects, but young children in the home does not, and marriage only contributes years of life expected for older men. People expect to live longer when they report high levels of emotional support, and the association is mediated entirely by the perception that one has someone to call on when one is sick. People with informal health support expect to live longer than those without it, and this is especially true for persons with physical impairments. Although informal health practices shape subjective life expectancy, they explain little of the effects of supportive relationships. People who smoke, drink heavily, and have poor nutritional habits expect shorter lives, and those who walk and exercise expect longer lives. Better current health is associated with higher subjective life expectancy, but it does not explain the impact of supportive relationships. Most of the impact of supportive relationships appears to be a direct result of projected security about the future. Feeling that you have someone who would care for you if sick appears to increase the sense of security about surviving future health crises, thereby increasing one's perceived inventory of the essential property--life itself.     

Electric animals: New models of everyday life?

The literature on everyday life has only imperfectly taken to itself the influence of modern information and communications technology, generally through the work of authors like Benjamin and the lettristes like de Certeau and Virilio. Part of the reason for this relative absence seems to be a concern that these technologies are, in some way, inauthentic. But such a reaction is no longer adequate. As software plasters the everyday world with a new and active surface, so the character of the everyday world is being changed. This change is based on theoretical models of the world that are written into software and which have as one of their key roots particular notions of biology. How can one understand this new kind of everyday life in which theoretical models of biology come back to haunt the surfaces that define us as they are incorporated in all manner of increasingly ‘lively’ devices? Obviously, a series of characterizations could be made but this paper proposes that one of the best of these may turn out to be that of the companion animal. Everyday life is chock full of these animals yet they too are hardly ever remarked upon in the literature: their strange familiarity is so obvious that they are deemed to be unworthy of notice. However, as software makes the world increasingly lively, perhaps we should start to think of its agency, especially as it is incarnated in various increasingly mobile objects, as calling forth similar kinds of relationship of dominance and affection – and a pressing ethical task.