Narratives of ageing and/or retiring and identity work: a conversation across theoretical perspectives on identity

This paper engages in a conversation across three theoretical perspectives on identity (sensemaking, storied resource, and critical) by exploring identity work research of individuals’ experiences of ageing and/or retiring. It achieves this by selecting a contemporary article on ageing and/or retiring, employing narrative analysis, from each perspective, and comparing and contrasting the authors’ language in describing the nature of identity work, and the aims and outcomes of their projects. Initial findings are presented in a table. The development paper, if accepted, will be developed by attempting to apply the different theoretically-informed emphases of narrative analysis to the author’s current identity research project on pre-retirees. In this way, the paper has the potential to make a theoretical contribution by evaluating the potential for cross-fertilisation between perspectives. The paper’s description of the different theoretically-informed ways of engaging narrative analysis might offer a methodological contribution.