Kierkegaard's oft-quoted phrase, "Life Can Only Be Understood Backwards; But It Must Be Lived Forwards" provides a useful introduction to Stephen Katz's work Disciplining Old Age: The Formation of Gerontological Knowledge. While the current study of aging and the practice of geriatrics and gerontology have, of course, developed forwards, by revisiting and reinterpreting their historical development, Katz convincingly documents that they too can best be understood backwards. Throughout his concise yet comprehensive text Katz masterfully traces the origins of much of current gerontologic and geriatrics thinking and focuses on the way in which the past not only informs our current thinking about aging but has also determined power relations as we provide services to solve, address, and even create the problems of old age.
Katz's work further advances the perspective of the "critical gerontologists" by examining the social, political, and economic conditions that helped frame the methodologies and perspectives of geriatrics, gerontology, and old age itself. Throughout, the broad conditions that dictated the disciplining of old age are chronicled with a focus on both how specific disciplines were created and perpetuated, and how older adults themselves have been "disciplined, or regulated." Building on the theoretical framework of Michel Foucault, Katz provides a rigorous theoretical and conceptual framework for understanding the ultimate and pervasive problematization of old age today. Western society's ultimate focus on the biomedical model with an emphasis on individual problems (versus a broader social model) is traced historically with remarkable detail.
Katz's text will be useful for advanced students in any field of aging and should be of special interest to those exploring the history of the development of professions in general and aging more specifically. The extensive annotated bibliography provides the reader with an exceptional guide for further study. Readers will also benefit greatly from the last chapter where Katz suggests how to "undiscipline" gerontology and old age and change the power relations that inform them so we can begin to accept, celebrate, or manage the diversity of old age. Katz ends by suggesting a new framework for both the study of old age and the practice of geriatrics and gerontology based upon his critical interpretation of the history of gerontology. Overall, this text will provide an exceptional addition to the critical study of aging and the disciplines surrounding it, including his questioning of both the formation of our thinking and our current practice environment.