The Debate on Physician-Assisted Death in the United States: A Narrative Analysis of Formula Stories
Graduation Year
2021
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree
Ph.D.
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
Degree Granting Department
Sociology
Major Professor
Donileen Loseke, Ph.D.
Co-Major Professor
Sara E. Green, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Margarethe Kusenbach, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Lori Roscoe, Ph.D.
Keywords
Culture, Symbolic Codes, Emotions, Disability, Policy
Abstract
Public policy discussions can be viewed as empirical windows into broadly shared culturalvalues and emotions of the social contexts in which the policy discussions take place. This project is a narrative analysis of the public debate on physician-assisted death (PAD), drawing from three data sources: newspaper articles, the websites of social movement organizations, and testimonies from a state legislative hearing. This analysis explores ways in which social actors deploy personal stories that contribute to shape the policy-making process by appealing to cultural beliefs and broadly shared emotions. The findings of this project constitute a contribution to the study of emotions as cultural phenomena, to the use of narrative analysis in the study of public policy, and to the adoption of constructionist approaches in the study of social problems and health and illness. A constructionist lens allows for the observation of not only differences but also commonalities in the competing narratives, helping to fill a gap in the literature on PAD, which is dominated by one-sided positivistic and critical approaches, predominantly within the areas of legal, biomedical, and disability studies.
Scholar Commons Citation
Blackwell, Rebecca, "The Debate on Physician-Assisted Death in the United States: A Narrative Analysis of Formula Stories" (2021). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/9661
