Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies
Personal narratives of alcohol and other drug addiction circulate widely in popular culture and they also have currency in professional therapeutic settings. Despite this, relatively little research has explored the conventions operating in these narratives and how they shape people's experienc...
| Main Authors: | , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Published: |
Elsevier BV
2017
|
| Online Access: | http://purl.org/au-research/grants/arc/DP140100996 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/54416 |
| _version_ | 1848759365938446336 |
|---|---|
| author | Pienaar, Kiran Dilkes-Frayne, E. |
| author_facet | Pienaar, Kiran Dilkes-Frayne, E. |
| author_sort | Pienaar, Kiran |
| building | Curtin Institutional Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Personal narratives of alcohol and other drug addiction circulate widely in popular culture and they also have currency in professional therapeutic settings. Despite this, relatively little research has explored the conventions operating in these narratives and how they shape people's experiences and identities. While research in this area often proceeds on the premise that addiction biographies are straightforwardly ‘true’ accounts, in this paper we draw on the insights of critical alcohol and other drug scholarship, and the concept of ‘ontological politics’ to argue that biographies produce normative ideas about addiction and those said to be experiencing it. Our analysis compares traditional addiction narratives with the biographies we reconstructed from qualitative interviews with 60 people in Australia who describe themselves as having an ‘addiction’, ‘dependence’ or drug ‘habit’. We track how addiction is variously enacted in these accounts and comment on the effects of particular enactments. By attending to the ways in which people cope, even thrive, with the kind of consumption that would attract a diagnosis of addiction or dependence, the biographies we produced disrupt the classic narrative of increasing drug use, decline and eventual collapse. Doing so allows for consideration of the benefits of consumption, as well as the ways that people carefully regulate it to minimise harms. It also constitutes individuals as active in managing consumption—an important move that challenges dominant understandings of addiction as a disorder of compulsivity. We conclude by considering the implications of our attempt to provide an alternative range of narratives, which resonate with people's diverse experiences. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T09:58:44Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | curtin-20.500.11937-54416 |
| institution | Curtin University Malaysia |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T09:58:44Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | Elsevier BV |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | curtin-20.500.11937-544162018-10-23T04:19:13Z Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies Pienaar, Kiran Dilkes-Frayne, E. Personal narratives of alcohol and other drug addiction circulate widely in popular culture and they also have currency in professional therapeutic settings. Despite this, relatively little research has explored the conventions operating in these narratives and how they shape people's experiences and identities. While research in this area often proceeds on the premise that addiction biographies are straightforwardly ‘true’ accounts, in this paper we draw on the insights of critical alcohol and other drug scholarship, and the concept of ‘ontological politics’ to argue that biographies produce normative ideas about addiction and those said to be experiencing it. Our analysis compares traditional addiction narratives with the biographies we reconstructed from qualitative interviews with 60 people in Australia who describe themselves as having an ‘addiction’, ‘dependence’ or drug ‘habit’. We track how addiction is variously enacted in these accounts and comment on the effects of particular enactments. By attending to the ways in which people cope, even thrive, with the kind of consumption that would attract a diagnosis of addiction or dependence, the biographies we produced disrupt the classic narrative of increasing drug use, decline and eventual collapse. Doing so allows for consideration of the benefits of consumption, as well as the ways that people carefully regulate it to minimise harms. It also constitutes individuals as active in managing consumption—an important move that challenges dominant understandings of addiction as a disorder of compulsivity. We conclude by considering the implications of our attempt to provide an alternative range of narratives, which resonate with people's diverse experiences. 2017 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/54416 10.1016/j.drugpo.2017.05.011 http://purl.org/au-research/grants/arc/DP140100996 http://purl.org/au-research/grants/arc/FT120100215 Elsevier BV fulltext |
| spellingShingle | Pienaar, Kiran Dilkes-Frayne, E. Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title | Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title_full | Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title_fullStr | Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title_full_unstemmed | Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title_short | Telling different stories, making new realities: The ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| title_sort | telling different stories, making new realities: the ontological politics of ‘addiction’ biographies |
| url | http://purl.org/au-research/grants/arc/DP140100996 http://purl.org/au-research/grants/arc/DP140100996 http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/54416 |