The Politics and Poetics of Aging: Ethnography of an Older Women’s Club in Santiago

Abstract

This article presents an ethnographic study of aging, gender, and the social organization of care in a women’s ceramics course given in a Community Center of Santiago Centro (Chile). Its theoretical framework focuses on the concepts of gender, aging, and care in social sciences. The study is based on an ethnography carried out over three years in a Community Center. The paper highlights the narratives, modes of organization, and dynamics articulated in this women’s club. Our analysis suggests that there is a political dimension to care. We argue that political dimensions are found in the women’s collective organization within their club: they are subjects endowed with lines of action, interaction, and politically placed discourse that stem from their own key interpretations. Finally, our findings suggest that this political agency is linked to at least four aspects of our protagonists’ experience in their club, which are described in the results.