The Sociology of Law
Online ISSN : 2424-1423
Print ISSN : 0437-6161
ISSN-L : 0437-6161
A Narrative Approach to Suffering and Overcoming
Yuji Noguchi
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2004 Volume 2004 Issue 60 Pages 139-152,237

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Abstract

This paper considers how the sufferings in our age are socially constructed and how we can overcome them and create an alternative story based on the narrative approach. Sufferings have been gradually regarded as some psychological entities such as Traumatic Stress or PTSD. This process can be called "psychologizing of reality" or "internalizing of sufferings" These require us to consult with a psychological or psychiatric expert and then the sufferings are individualized, personalized, and pathologized without considering its social origins or backgrounds. Against these conditions, narrative approaches propose some new strategies: externalizing of the problem to invalidate or de-construct the dominant story of sufferings, providing a narrative community to encourage sufferers to tell the alternative story on their lived experience. Suffering and overcoming are not psychological entities but social products through our everyday discursive practices. Narrative approaches show us the new way to understand sufferings and to listen sufferers' narratives against the dominant discourse.

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© The Japanese Association of Sociology of Law
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