Ageing populations have gradually become a major concern in many industrialised countries over the past fifty years, drawing the attention of both politics and science. The target of a raft of health and social policies, older people are often identified as a specific, and vulnerable, population. At the same time, ageing has become a specialisation in many disciplines - medicine, sociology, psychology, to name but three – and a discipline of its own: gerontology. This book questions the framing of old age by focusing on the relationships between policy making and the production of knowledge. The first part explores how the meeting of scientific expertise and the politics of old age anchors the construction of both individual and collective relationships to the future. Part II brings to light the many ways in which issues relating to ageing can be instrumentalised and ideologised in several public debate arenas. Part III argues that scientific knowledge itself composes with objectivity, bringing ideologies of its own to the table, and looks at how this impacts discourse about ageing. In the final part, the contributors discuss how the frames can themselves be experienced at different levels of the division of labour, whether it is by people who work on them (legislators or scientists), by people working with them (professional carers) or by older people themselves. Unpacking the political and moral dimensions of scientific research on ageing, this cutting-edge volume brings together a range of multidisciplinary, European perspectives, and will be of use to all those interested in old age and the social sciences.

“Cukier and his co-authors have a more ambitious project than Kahneman and Harari. They don’t want to just point out how powerfully we are influenced by our perspectives and prejudices—our frames. They want to show us that these frames are tools, and that we can optimise their use.” —Forbes From pandemics to populism, AI to ISIS, wealth inequity to climate change, humanity faces unprecedented challenges that threaten our very existence. The essential tool that will enable humanity to find the best way foward is defined in Framers by internationally renowned authors Kenneth Cukier, Viktor Mayer-Schönberger, and Francis de Véricourt. To frame is to make a mental model that enables us to make sense of new situations. Frames guide the decisions we make and the results we attain. People have long focused on traits like memory and reasoning, leaving framing all but ignored. But with computers becoming better at some of those cognitive tasks, framing stands out as a critical function—and only humans can do it. This book is the first guide to mastering this human ability. Illustrating their case with compelling examples and the latest research, authors Cukier, Mayer-Schönberger, and de Véricourt examine: · Why advice to “think outside the box” is useless · How Spotify beat Apple by reframing music as an experience · How the #MeToo twitter hashtag reframed the perception of sexual assault · The disaster of framing Covid-19 as equivalent to seasonal flu, and how framing it akin to SARS delivered New Zealand from the pandemic Framers shows how framing is not just a way to improve how we make decisions in the era of algorithms—but why it will be a matter of survival for humanity in a time of societal upheaval and machine prosperity.

Essays on the emerging legal issues surrounding age discrimination and moves to create equality in the EU and UK.

Dist. for Rijksmuseum & Waanders Pub., Text in Dutch/English.

The Roman empire tends to be seen as a whole whereas the early middle ages tends to be seen as a collection of regional histories, roughly corresponding to the land-areas of modern nation states. As a result, early medieval history is much more fragmented, and there have been few convincing syntheses of socio-economic change in the post-Roman world since the 1930s. In recent decades, the rise of early medieval archaeology has also transformed our source-base, but this has not been adequately integrated into analyses of documentary history in almost any country. In Framing the Early Middle Ages Chris Wickham combines documentary and archaeological evidence to create a comparative history of the period 400-800. His analysis embraces each of the regions of the late Roman and immediately post-Roman world, from Denmark to Egypt. The book concentrates on classic socio-economic themes, state finance, the wealth and identity of the aristocracy, estate management, peasant society, rural settlement, cities, and exchange. These give only a partial picture of the period, but they frame and explain other developments. Earlier syntheses have taken the development of a single region as 'typical', with divergent developments presented as exceptions. This book takes all different developments as typical, and aims to construct a synthesis based on a better understanding of difference and the reasons for it.

Framing ADHD Children explores the three social worlds of Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder: the home, classroom, and clinic. Through intensive interviews with teachers, parents, clinicians, and ADHD children, this book brings to light the human experiences surrounding this behavior disorder. The experiences of interview participants are supplemented with the most detailed historical discussion of ADHD to date, including the past and present debates about the true 'nature' of the disorder, issues concerning children taking stimulant medications, and the continuing discussion of whether or not modern technology can really detect ADHD in the brain. Both the history of ADHD and the people interviewed here demonstrate that ADHD is far from a cut-and-dry phenomenon, but rather a complex social process that requires the negotiation of uncertainty and ambiguity at every step.

Author, activist, and TED speaker Ashton Applewhite has written a rousing manifesto calling for an end to discrimination and prejudice on the basis of age. In our youth obsessed culture, we’re bombarded by media images and messages about the despairs and declines of our later years. Beauty and pharmaceutical companies work overtime to convince people to purchase products that will retain their youthful appearance and vitality. Wrinkles are embarrassing. Gray hair should be colored and bald heads covered with implants. Older minds and bodies are too frail to keep up with the pace of the modern working world and olders should just step aside for the new generation. Ashton Applewhite once held these beliefs too until she realized where this prejudice comes from and the damage it does. Lively, funny, and deeply researched, This Chair Rocks traces her journey from apprehensive boomer to pro-aging radical, and in the process debunks myth after myth about late life. Explaining the roots of ageism in history and how it divides and debases, Applewhite examines how ageist stereotypes cripple the way our brains and bodies function, looks at ageism in the workplace and the bedroom, exposes the cost of the all-American myth of independence, critiques the portrayal of elders as burdens to society, describes what an all-age-friendly world would look like, and offers a rousing call to action. It’s time to create a world of age equality by making discrimination on the basis of age as unacceptable as any other kind of bias. Whether you’re older or hoping to get there, this book will shake you by the shoulders, cheer you up, make you mad, and change the way you see the rest of your life. Age pride! “Wow. This book totally rocks. It arrived on a day when I was in deep confusion and sadness about my age. Everything about it, from my invisibility to my neck. Within four or five wise, passionate pages, I had found insight, illumination, and inspiration. I never use the word empower, but this book has empowered me.” —Anne Lamott, New York Times bestselling author