Spending time: the discursive construction of leisure in later life

ABSTRACT

Healthy ageing is encapsulated in policy prescriptions for ‘active’ ageing, which include expectations around active leisure. Focusing on healthy ageing has been critiqued for oppressing older people who cannot meet ideals of physical activity and for neglecting leisure as enjoyment. To understand leisure in later life, we analysed the ways older people talk about spending time. In-depth interviews with 153 older people provided the data for this discourse analysis. Two discourses were identified: leisure as productive time and leisure as personal time. Leisure as productive time links leisure time activity to the maintenance of health and a valued social identity as an actively ageing citizen. Leisure was also constructed as personal time, in which older age is the time to prioritize enjoyment and focus on pleasure foregone in earlier life. Discourses of leisure as productive potentially crowd out the experience of enjoyment as a valued pursuit in its own right.

KEYWORDS:

• Ageing
• discourse analysis
• healthy ageing
• leisure

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding information

This study was funded by the New Zealand Foundation for Research Science and Technology, now Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment [Grant Number MAUX 09/02].

Notes on contributors

Dr Mary Breheny is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Public Health at Massey University, New Zealand. Dr Breheny’s research focuses on understanding how social and economic issues influence health and wellbeing across the life course. In particular, she is interested in the ways that inequalities throughout the lifespan accumulate in later life and constrain older people from ageing well.

Christine Stephens is a professor of social science research in the School of Psychology at Massey University, New Zealand. She conducts research in health psychology focused on the health of older people in relation to their social location and the effects of changing discourses of ageing. Professor Stephens’ research currently focuses on the social networks of older people and the ways in which material aspects of social life, such as housing arrangements, intersect with and construct social relations.

ORCID

Mary Breheny http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1603-8033

Christine Stephens http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1325-3579