Third Agers in India: Empirical Evidence From Longitudinal Aging Study in India (LASI), 2017-2018.

Given that the ontological origins of the Third Age lie in the cultural logics of social class, consumer society and "habitus," a majority of its gerontological examination is qualitative in nature. We utilize the recently released Longitudinal Aging Study in India (2017-2018) and harness the time-use module to offer an empirical portrait of Third Agers in India. Considering that the aging scholarship in India has been often articulated in the empirical language of dependency, care regimes, and (economic) insecurity, we believe this examination allows us to shift the gerontological gaze from a risk perspective to one that is positive and affirmative.

Social egg freezing as ambivalent materialities of aging.

This commentary explores how the material-nonmaterial transactions around reproduction among women raise paradoxical questions of reproductive autonomy and commercialization of reproduction. Drawing from medical anthropological studies on human reproduction, the technology around social egg freezing has been conceived to proffer ambivalent possibilities of hope, despair, and repair as mature women recalibrate their reproductive identities, especially in pronatalist contexts. Building on the material-discursive critique of the 'material turn', I ask if social egg freezing offers an empowering biological reprieve for women who have 'chosen' a non-normative (i.

Leisure as social engagement: does it moderate the association between subjective wellbeing and depression in later life?

Objectives: To investigate the role of leisure (as social engagement) in moderating the association between subjective wellbeing and depressive symptoms among older Indians.

Methods: The sample included data from 39,538 older adults (aged 55-80) from the Longitudinal Aging Study in India (LASI, Wave-1), 2017-2018. Individual level questionnaire was used to examine the relationship among social engagement, subjective wellbeing, and depressive symptoms.

"I Don't Want to Have the Time When I Do Nothing": Aging and Reconfigured Leisure Practices During the Pandemic.

In this paper, we contend that urban middle-class older Indians engaged in "serious leisure" as a way to reimagine and reconfigure the structure of everyday life during the pandemic-led epochal downtime. In particular, we heuristically show that leisure activity patterns and constraint negotiation strategies among older Indians followed conceptual semblances with the dominant leisure-based typology of . By thematically analysing household surveys (n = 71), time-use diaries and in-depth interviews (n = 15) of middle to upper middle-class individuals (55-80 years), we show how both men and women distinguished between serious leisure that is marked by motivation, agency and perseverance with that of unstructured, routinized free-time (or causal leisure).

Blocked by Gender: Disparities in COVID19 infection detection in Tamil Nadu, India.

Globally, a gender gap in COVID-19 has been noted with men reporting higher share of both morbidity and deaths compared to women. While the gender gap in fatalities has been similar across the globe, there have been interesting disparities in the detection of COVID-19 cases in men and women. While wealthier, more developed nations have generally seen similar case detection in men and women, LMICs especially in Asia have seen far greater proportion of COVID-19 cases among men than women.

Understanding the Role of Stigma and Misconceptions in the Experience of Epilepsy in India: Findings From a Mixed-Methods Study.

It is surprising that although 12 million people in India suffer from epilepsy this remains a thoroughly under-researched area in the sociology of health and practice. We address this intellectual and policy neglect by reviewing the social, psychological and legal challenges governing the lives of people living with epilepsy (PWE) by paying particular attention to negotiations in arranged marriages and employment. Drawing on the analytical frameworks of the sociological study of stigma, critical race theory and paying attention to the cultural models of health and suffering, this study utilized a combination of (online) survey data ( = 100) and in-depth qualitative interviews ( = 10) with PWE and their families.

: Gerontological Reflections on the Life Course Perspective's Missing Plot.

Gyllenhaal's with its deeply troubling, turbulent and yet unwavering chaos allows us to rethink how the past is never really lost. It is in the uneasy dialectic between individual lives, social structures, and emotional states that finds an unexpected gerontological articulation. Specifically, this article utilizes one of the assured tools of gerontology- the life course perspective- to argue that the persisting effects of social-psychological states (e.

Aging, housing markets and social inclusion: Insights from India.

In this piece, I draw attention on how the booming real estate market in India is patterned around the axes of social inequality. Specifically, it argues that in a socio-economic context of depressed later life incomes with declining familial support, a singular focus on (upper) middle class niche senior living market is both exclusionary and misguided. The empirical basis for this argument comes from a range of press coverage on the inviting market for seniors as well as the recently released Government of India report (Model Guidelines for Development and Regulation of Retirement Homes, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, 2019) on the regulatory framework for privately managed 'retirement homes' for the 'urban upper and middle income elderly'.

Hymen interrupted: Negotiating body, markets, and consumerist modernity in India.

In this commentary, I contend that in a context marked by a slow but steady rise in sexual liberalism around the ideals of female sexuality and desire, the pressure to remain virginal is manifested through a potent nexus of markets and moral economies associated with gender and intimacy. Drawing on qualitative interviews with surgeons specialising in female genital aesthetic surgeries, particularly hymenoplasty, in New Delhi, Ahmedabad, and Bangalore, I show how restorative cosmetic surgeries on healthy bodies are proffered through the language of duty, autonomous choice, and the (neoliberal) market. Further, building on the sociological concepts of "moral consumption" and "progress through pleasure", I show how consumerism-led modernity makes pleasure a 'biopolitical burden', and the cosmetic industry, a regulatory vehicle, disciplining female sexuality to conform with male honour codes.

Living solo at midlife: Can the pandemic de-stigmatize living alone in India?

In this piece I argue that the pandemic with its emphasis on social distancing as a desirable civic norm can reconfigure popular understanding of mature female singlehood in India- a condition that is often described in the language of lacks and social failures. The pandemic, I argue, has reaffirmed the everyday practices of upper middle-class professional women (ages 50-60 years) lending them as positive agentic subjects who are invested in self-actualization and an appreciation of intimate solitude. Overall, by specifically focusing on subjectivities and social aspirations of my interlocutors during the pandemic, I illuminate ways in which middle aged selfhood is lived in all its fragility, ambivalence and emergent possibilities.

Giving Voice to the Environment as the Silent Partner in Aging: Examining the Moderating Roles of Gender and Family Structure in Older Adult Wellbeing.

Gerontological scholarship has long seen the environment to be a silent partner in aging. Environmental Gerontology, an established approach in Social Gerontology, has shown how the everyday lives of older adults are deeply entangled in socio-spatial environments. Adopting an Environmental Gerontology approach, we explore social and cultural dimensions of the association between out-of-home mobility and wellbeing among older adults in a north western city of India.

Women's empowerment as self-compassion?: Empirical observations from India.

Although ICPD brought about an international consensus on the centrality of women's empowerment and gender equity as desired national goals, the conceptualization and measurement of empowerment in demography and economics have been largely understood in a relational and in a family welfare context where women's altruistic behaviour within the household is tied either to developmental or child health outcomes. The goals of this study were twofold: (1) to offer an empirical examination of the household level empowerment measure through the theoretical construct of self-compassion and investigate its association with antenatal health, and (2) to ensure robust psychometric quality for this new measure. Drawing data from the nationally representative, multi-topic dataset of 42, 152 households, India Human Development Survey, IHDS II (2011-2012), the study performed a confirmatory factor analysis followed by an OLS estimation to investigate the association between a self-compassionate based empowerment and antenatal care.

Aging in e-place: reflections on online communities for the aged in India.

In this short piece, I offer a reconfiguration of the term "aging in place" by analyzing media content of web-based senior-focused portals while demonstrating how these online consumer-driven spaces unwittingly re-create new social relations and imagined communities. Building on the sparse body of scholarship on extra-familial, kin-like networks, I reflect on the cultural possibility of internet spaces as surrogate "places" for later life non-kin sociality. In this exploration, I privilege the possibility of enriched selfhood of older Indians by moving away from the conventional gerontological trope of the (Indian) elderly as indivisible familial subjects, as a deliberate process of decolonizing the field of gerontology.

Media and age-coded representations of later life: An analysis of selected print advertisements of English-language magazines in India.

This study examines the representation of older adults in print advertisements in an English-language magazine in post-reform India. Employing content analysis, this study finds a growing disenchantment of the Indian media with the image of a "happy joint family." A higher proportion of older adults are now portrayed alone or with younger adults compared to earlier portrayals with people of all age groups in an ad.

Life-Stage and Mobility: An Exploratory GPS Study of Mobility in Multigenerational Families, Ahmedabad, India.

As the population of older adults in India grows, research is needed to plan a sustainable future for India's older adults. This article reports results from a Global Positioning System (GPS)-based pilot study that examined the mobility of middle-class, older adults living in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India. Using mobility as a lens through which to examine the lives of older adults, we map potential research and identify policy areas of interest considering older adults in urban India.

Living Arrangements and Health of Older Adults in India.

Objectives: We investigate the association between the multigenerational household context and health of older adults in India, taking into account potential selection effects.

Methods: Using data from the India Human Development Survey (2004-05), a nationally representative multitopic data set, we employed a two-step analytical strategy--logistic regression followed by propensity score stratification method--to model the effect of contrasting living arrangement types on short-term illness.

Results: Overall, older adults living in multigenerational households have the lowest levels of short-term illness.