What Remains? Salvaging Meaning from “Dementia Friendly Communities” Using Cut-Ups and Collage

Abstract

This paper explores the possibilities of using alternative forms of analysis when thinking about “dementia friendly communities,” a recent if not by now historic phenomenon. Using ethnographic methods, I ask the question: what remains beyond, in excess of, and is never quite captured in discourses around such communities, if they exist? Dementia is an elusive concept, often appearing as personal disruption, and often threatening the ways that contemporary lives are ordered. I ask whether there is value in questioning the fragmentary remains of researching dementia friendly communities from a different angle, by approaching the disparate assemblage of materials, fieldnotes, photos, recordings of ordinary practices, of state practices, through more creative means? Taking inspiration from the avant-garde techniques of William S. Burroughs, in particular cut-ups and collage, the aim here has been to pay attention differently and move beyond what is already known.