Doing Normalcy. Attractive interactions for teenage boys with disabilities

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The contemporary expansion of diagnoses is a well-known phenomenon. What is rarely investigated, however, are people’s subtle ways of deconstructing medical stigmas in everyday interactions. This article, based on an ethnographic study of a recreational activity for teenage boys with diverse diagnoses and disabilities (for instance, Asperger’s syndrome, ADHD, and cerebral pares), shows how a de-stigmatizing “normalcy” may be interactively and situationally maintained in the periphery of a society’s health care system. The studied activity takes place in a garage setting and is built around repair work on an old American car. The practical and mundane elements of this activity, analyzed thematically as “garage work”, “the jargon”, “doing nothing”, and “a coffee ritual”, proved to supply significant occasions for deconstructing stigmatized selves in undramatic ways.
Original languageEnglish
JournalInternational Journal of Sociological Research
Publication statusAccepted/In press - 2008

Subject classification (UKÄ)

  • Sociology (excluding Social Work, Social Psychology and Social Anthropology)

Free keywords

  • disability
  • diagnoses
  • stigma
  • sociology
  • interaction
  • normalcy
  • sociologi

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