In Control and out of Control. The Discourse on Intoxication among Young Finnish Women in the 1980s and 2000s

Abstract

AIMS

The article focuses on the discourse on intoxication and its changes among young women in Finland. According to surveys, drinking among Finnish women has been rising for decades. Especially young women have been in the front line in the raise of drinking and intoxication-oriented drinking. However, statistics are not able to explain the factors behind this change. What has happened to women's attitudes and connotations related to binge drinking during the past decades? How do young women in their twenties perceive being drunk and how has the description of their relationship to this condition changed over the last 20 years?

Methods and Data

To explore these questions, the present article compares interview materials concerning drinking collected among young adults in 1985 and 2005/2007. The article analyses how young women identify themselves with intoxication in these periods and how the way in which women describe this relationship has changed in the meantime.

Results

The greatest change has to do with how young women regard drunkenness while presenting themselves. Whereas in the 1985 material young women distanced themselves from binge drinking, 20 years later they identify themselves strongly with it. The analysis shows that this development illustrares that both the significance of drunkenness in itself and the way in which drinking-related self-expression has changed.

Conclusions

The results relate to the changes in Finnish drinking culture which have been more pronounced in the case of women than men as well as the change of acceptable and desirable images of femininity.