Understanding the Experiential World of the Dying: Limits to Sociological Research

Abstract

In recent years there has been a proliferation of literature on Sociology of Dying. However, sociologists often treat the experience of those who are critically ill as similar to those who are really dying. This article argues that the level of emotional experience of one who is facing death is different from one who is critically ill but can intellectually anticipate it as the end of one's existence. In other words, dying though mostly contiguous with illness experience is not to be treated as synonymous with it. The article further shows how the complex issues related to the dying person's world defy a systematic sociological enquiry. Many of the conventional methods of sociological research fail to gain access to the self of the dying. It concludes by suggesting the need for a thorough rejuvenation of sociological methods and theories to accommodate the dying phenomenon.

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