Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction: Becoming Old, Becoming Sick
Tell the Guys at the Coffee Shop That I'm Seeing My Anthropologist
It Takes a Little While to Find Out for Sure
It's a Nasty, Hiding Disease
I'm a Little Disappointed in That I Don't Know What to Blame It On
I Don't Know What's Worse-Parkinson's Disease or the Medications
It Gets Worse
I Am More of the Parent Than a Wife
Conclusion: Aging, Embodiment, and Conditions
Appendix A: Interview Participants
Appendix B: Parkinson's Disease Resources
Subtitle: Aging with
Parkinson's Disease in America's Heartland Author:
Samantha Solimeo Subject:Anthropology,
Health and Medicine Paper ISBN: 978-0-8135-4544-8 Cloth ISBN: 978-0-8135-4543-1 Pages: 232 pages Publication Date: May 2009 Series:
Studies
in Medical Anthropology
Praise for With Shaking Hands
"A richly detailed and
touching ethnographic portrayal of the experiences of elderly people
with Parkinson's disease. It is pertinent reading for researchers and
clinicians as well as students, especially but not exclusively those in
medical anthropology."—Judith C.
Barker, University of California, San Francisco
"An important and excellent book that describes the experience of
Parkinson's disease from the inside: how patients and their family
members view it. Thus, it forms a singular contribution to the
scientific literature on individual experience and disease."—Robert L.
Rubinstein, author of Singular
Paths: Single Men Living Alone
Description:
Far from celebrity media spotlight,
ordinary individuals, many older and less advantaged, suffer the
disabling pain of Parkinson’s Disease (PD), an illness whose
progressive symptoms often mimic old age and cause mobility impairment,
communication barriers, and social isolation.
At the heart of With Shaking Hands
is the account of elder Americans in rural Iowa who have been diagnosed
with PD. With a focus on the impact of chronic illness on an aging
population, Samantha Solimeo combines clear and accessible prose with
qualitative and quantitative research to demonstrate how PD
accelerates, mediates, and obscures patterns of aging. She explores how
ideas of what to expect in older age influence and direct
interpretations of one’s body.
This sensitive and groundbreaking work unites theories of disease with
modern conceptions of the body in biological and social terms. PD, like
other chronic disorders, presents a special case of embodiment which
challenge our thinking about how such diseases should be researched and
how they are experienced.About the Author:
Samantha Solimeo is
a lecturer in the department of sociology and anthropology at North
Carolina State University.
