Aging with drug use: Theorizing intersectionally with material gerontology and critical drug studies

Abstract

Rethinking old age and what aging means within the context and materiality of drug use, this paper asks, ‘how does drug use matter in old age?’ and follows a series of conceptual arguments to link aging studies and critical drug studies with material gerontology in an intersectional analysis. To do this, four research areas are reviewed to conceptualize habitual drug use in old age. First, aging is explored through its biological, subjective, and socio-material representations. Secondly, the merits of material gerontological thinking are discussed and developed in connection to marginalization and related intersectionality representing the third and fourth areas of research, respectively. Conceptual results suggest a model of ‘embodied-drugged-aging,’ an integrated conceptual approach which neither categorizes nor abstracts aging with drug use from its social and material contexts.