Subject in the Making: Technologies of the Self and Aspirations for a Good Life in Contemporary Denmark

ABSTRACT

Coping with crisis is fundamental for human life, but so is the pursuit of everything good and fruitful. We revisit Foucault’s technologies of the self as an analytical lens for what people do when pursuing a good life in contemporary Denmark. Comparing three emerging self-improvement domains; psychedelic micro-dosing, meditation and mindfulness, and fitness self-tracking, we explore processes though which individuals become subjects of their own actions. We argue that engaging in these transformational practices produces and reflects different notions of self, yet all involve attempts at managing vulnerabilities by accepting, controlling and balancing tensions between self-making and relation-making.

KEYWORDS:

• Denmark
• psychedelic micro-dosing
• spirituality
• fitness self-tracking
• self-enhancement
• vulnerability

Acknowledgement

We would like to thank all our interlocutors without whom this research would not have been possible. We would also like to thank our anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The research for this article has been made possible by a grant from the Danish Research Council [grant number; DFF-6107-0021].

Notes on contributors

Margit Anne Petersen

Margit Anne Petersen is an anthropologist, and associate professor at the Centre for Alcohol and Drug Research at Aarhus University. Her research focuses on psychedelic drug use and self-improvement practices.

Aja Smith

Aja Smith is an anthropologist and post doc at the Department of Anthropology at Aarhus University. Her research focuses on spirituality, multispecies and bodily-affective methodologies.

Dorthe Brogaard Kristensen

Dorthe Brogaard Kristensen is an anthropologist and associate professor at Department of Business and Marketing at University of Southern Denmark. Her research focuses on health and digital technologies.

Klaus Hoeyer

Klaus Hoeyer is an anthropologist and professor at The Centre for Medical Sciences and Technology Studies, Department of Public Health, at University of Copenhagen. His research focuses on datafication and ethics.