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Research on Aging
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Narrative Accrual and the Life Course

Marilyn Nouri

State University of New York

Marilyn Helterline

State University of New York

In this article, first the idea of seeing the life course as narratively constructed is developed, and then that approach is used to explore how elders construct meaning about the life course in their later years. One area of meaning that persons tell narratives about is the relationship between the cosmos and the will. The narrative self is a standpoint through which aging adults develop a story line. Narrative accrual of the events of life and the stories about them led to five types of life story lines about fate: the American dream of success, life as a struggle, the life as shared story line, God determines, and life is simple. Referentiality of the stories in narrative accrual was then considered. Beyond the "reporting of facts" as a basis for reference, gender and the characteristics of the oppositions of social life provided the authors with "reality." Clearly women and men authored the fate-problem in different ways. The oppositions of social life provided the "plights" of individual stories as well as enabled narrative accrual. There is a notion of "final interpretation" or "final comprehension" so that life's existence makes some kind of sense, at least for the time being.

Research on Aging, Vol. 20, No. 1, 36-64 (1998)
DOI: 10.1177/0164027598201004
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