Approaches to Discourse in Dementia »

From an interdisciplinary perspective, Guendouzi (speech pathology and audiology, U. of South Alabama, Mobile) and Muller (communication disorders, U. of Louisiana, Lafayette) introduce the shift away from focusing primarily on neurological impairment to a care model emphasizing individual's functional skills and challenges as embedded within multiple social contexts. This trend also extends the field's traditions of applying qualitative methods to analyzing discourse between people. After introducing Luria's concept of a "romantic science" of the "wealth of living reality" and types of dementia, they examine discourse from interaction sociolinguistics, critical discourse analysis, pragmatics, and other approaches. Appendices include notations for, and examples of, transcribing participants' conversations. Annotation © 2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR