An investigation into how women over seventy years old and living in an inner London borough experience and understand their positions as old(er)women

It has been argued that both mainstream and feminist theory and research that
considers questions of ageing and old(er) age, contains biases due to being
predicated on middle-aged and problem-focused perspectives. The aim of this
investigation was to use a material-discursive epistemology to consider how women
over seventy years old, and living in an inner London borough, themselves
experience and understand their positions as older women, in order to redress these
biases. This aim was split into three parts to emphasise the reflective activity
engaged in by the participants, the socio-cultural context in which this took place,
and the material aspects of their positions.
Seven participants took part in semi-structures interviews, and the resulting
transcripts were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis. The
participants spoke about their positions as old(er) women from a personal
perspective, in terms of the changing roles and relationships associated with their
positions, and in terms of changes in contemporary Western societies that had
occurred over their lifetimes. In relating the analysis back to the aims of the
investigation a number of implications were drawn, that can be considered
theoretical, clinical, and political.
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