Abstract
Older women make up one of the world’s largest and most rapidly growing subpopulations, yet surprisingly little is known about the health, wealth, and well-being of older women worldwide. In 2013, the number of persons ages 60+ worldwide topped 841 million; women outnumbered men by a ratio of 1.2:1 among those ages 60+ and 1.6:1 among those ages 80 and older (United Nations, 2013). Yet aggregate-level population statistics provide us few insights into the tremendously varied experiences of older women. Popular media images in the United States and most wealthy western nations would have us believe that older women are uniformly White, married (or recently widowed), slender, and surrounded by loved ones to whom they both give and receive social support. These images, like aggregated statistics, conceal the fact that older women are a highly heterogeneous group, stratified by age, social class, birth cohort, educational attainment, race, sexual orientation, marital status, health status, and physical appearance. Each of these sources of difference is also a source of power or lack thereof, profoundly shaping the lived experiences of older women. Women and Aging: An International, Intersectional Power Perspective provides a provocative and eye-opening exploration of what older women’s lives are really like, and it persuasively shows that the experiences of older women worldwide are inextricably linked to social structures that provide them with, or deprive them of, political and personal power.
This edited volume features the writings of feminist scholars, spanning the academic fields of biology, economics, gender studies, psychology, organizational behavior, and social work. Each chapter tackles a distinctive topic, yet contributes to the larger mission by focusing squarely on the role of power (or lack thereof) in older women’s lives. The volume also explicitly acknowledges that although the feminist movement and social changes of the 1960s provided unprecedented opportunities for baby boom women, these opportunities were not availed to all. Each of the chapters is a thoughtful synthesis and critique of prior research, although none present new empirical analyses.
In her introduction, the coeditor Varda Muhlbauer articulates the book’s thesis that “women’s aging process is occurring in a sociopolitical context that tends to stratify older women along status lines and power resources” (p. 6). The subsequent chapters explore the ways that older women’s bodies are a source of both empowerment and disempowerment (Chrisler, Rossini, and Newton); older women’s economic power and importance as consumers (Schein and Haruvi); the ways that multiple social roles such as spouse, parent, family caregiver, volunteer, and grandmother shape older women’s well-being (Kulik); older women’s “encore” careers (Denmark, Goldstein, Thies, and Tworecke); sociocultural influences on older women’s sexual desire and desirability (McHugh and Interligi); older lesbians’ characteristics, experiences, and rights worldwide (Rose and Hospital); and a review and assessment of clinical interventions to protect and uphold the emotional health of older women (O’Brien and Whitbourne).
Women and Aging is an engaging and thought-provoking book. The chapters cohere beautifully, creating an edited volume in which the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The book is ideally suited for graduate courses in gender, aging, sexuality, and the life course. Readers will come away with shattered preconceived notions and deep knowledge of women in later life.