ABSTRACT
Participants’ ageing-relevant terms and expressions are overwhelmingly accepted by recipients, either with an explicit agreement token or by simply letting the term or expression stand. The identities being constructed are also a factor; and one point that emerges is that older identities are not necessarily the only or even main identity being orientated to in many of these uses. Like Mrs Farming, Mrs France asserts the legitimacy and particularity of her complaint – and thereby its entitlement to sympathy – in the face of the generalizing nature of Joellen’s older-age explanation. In effect, and like some of the participants in Shirley Naslund’s and Thell and Jacobsson’s studies in health-related contexts, both women work to negotiate the ‘real’ reason of their ailment, but in an ordinary everyday rather than a medical or therapeutic setting.
