Hi,
We have had a couple of places freed up for the workshop detailed below, this coming Tuesday (June 21st) in London. The workshop is funded and we can refund expenses for travel and 1 nights accommodation, within reason, for participants to come for the full day.
If you're interested, please email to BOTH me, [log in to unmask], and Sam Brown [log in to unmask] ASAP.
cheers
Rosie
Unpacking climate and energy vulnerability and older age
A multi-disciplinary InCluESEV workshop
June 21st 2011 9am-5pm (speaker programme starting at 9.15)
The small meeting house, Friends Meeting House, 173 Euston Road, London NW1 2BJ
Speakers: Professor George Havenith, University of Loughborough
Dr Sari Kovats, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
Professor Paul Higgs, UCL
Dr Janet Rudge, London Metropolitan University
Dr Sam Brown, Lancaster University
Dr Rosie Day, University of Birmingham
In the UK older people are widely defined as a ‘vulnerable’ group in energy related matters. This is principally framed in terms of an inability to keep sufficiently warm during winter and is reflected in the excess winter deaths that we see every year. That these deaths are higher in the UK than in colder European countries has led to nationwide debates and the creation of a fuel poverty agenda that has united politicians, academics and activists. This increased winter mortality is understood through biomedical science as the effect of the cold on an ageing physiology, which, by being less able to generate and retain heat, is more susceptible to cooler environments than its younger equivalents. Accordingly the UK fuel poverty strategy highlights both the physiological vulnerability of older people and the social conditions that expose older bodies to unhealthy temperatures, such as lowered incomes after retirement. The policy measures it puts forward pay particular attention to the over 60s, for example through the winter fuel allowance. Looking forward, in scenarios of climate change and hotter cities particularly, it is thought older people are going to be especially vulnerable to fuel poverty / energy vulnerability manifest with respect to their ability to keep cool, for example through the use of air conditioning or electric fans.
However, this largely biomedical framing of vulnerability is potentially challengeable on a number of levels. Critical social gerontologists have long been concerned with the social and cultural construction of age and ageing and ways in which discourses about older age are brought to bear, serving perhaps particular political and economic interests. Debates about ageism have questioned the necessity of employing age as a marker or organising principle in policy and in societal life more widely. Issues around the stigmatisation of old age and the identity politics of age have been highlighted in work that explores strategies of resistance among older people themselves in many contexts. Social policy ostensibly directed at older people’s welfare therefore has been subject to critical examination regarding its potential role in contributing to ageism and the oppression of older people in society.
In energy related policy, the biomedical vulnerability discourse currently dominates with respect to older age, but we feel it stands to benefit from engagement with more critical takes on ageing and social policy. We also believe that critical gerontologists could usefully reflect on the challenge to constructionist positions on ageing that may be posed by evidence on fuel poverty and excess winter and summer deaths. The overall aim of our workshop is to facilitate challenging but constructive engagement between researchers from different disciplines and practitioners with regard to the phenomenon of ageing especially as it relates to and affects energy needs, and to distil some useful and considered thoughts on how policy should best be framed and enacted in order to promote older peoples wellbeing in the widest sense.
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