Your Own Personal Illness: Interpretation through the Spiritual Malady in Alcoholics Anonymous
Some Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) members conceive of the fundamental problem they share as a “spiritual malady.” Based on fieldwork among three AA groups in Nova Scotia, Canada, this article advances an ethnographic description of the concept. Through a close examination of how the spiritual malady wa...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2022
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| In: |
Ethos
Year: 2022, Volume: 50, Issue: 1, Pages: 90-107 |
| Further subjects: | B
private and public symbols
B Addiction B Selfhood B Alcoholics Anonymous |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Some Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) members conceive of the fundamental problem they share as a “spiritual malady.” Based on fieldwork among three AA groups in Nova Scotia, Canada, this article advances an ethnographic description of the concept. Through a close examination of how the spiritual malady was interpreted by my interlocutors, I propose that the concept creates a cultural framework for the articulation of subjectivities and the interpretation of psychologies. I argue that it exists through a reciprocity of private and public meanings that are more the product of interactions between AA members than the learning and repetition of a formal ideology. This analysis becomes a means of exploring the agency of AA members as producers of meaningful representations of the challenges they feel they hold in common. |
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| ISSN: | 1548-1352 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Ethos
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1111/etho.12330 |
