Dorothy Jerrome

The Significance of Friendship for Women in Later Life

As middle-class women enter retirement, through giving up a job or losing a spouse or dependent relative, they adopt different friendship strategies. Some extend and deepen existing relationships; some make new friends; some develop the role of ‘good neighbour’; some grow closer to siblings. One of the most popular ways of making friends is to join a voluntary association, but this strategy is not always successful. Between them, friends provide a variety of services, supports and company. Old friends contribute something unique to the acceptance of ageing and adjustment to changing circumstances. Middle-class friendships have a hedonistic quality which matches the lifestyle of middle-class women in retirement.

“That's what it's all about”: Old people's organizations as a context for aging

Abstract Old people who join age-segregated organizations have several advantages over their peers. They start with additional personal resources—physical, social, emotional, and material. Through association with peers they are able in addition to confront age-related losses in a supportive setting. The old peoples clubs and Christian fellowships that provide a focus for this anthropological study are viewed as sources of social integration; vehicles for the expression of generational consciousness; arenas for the acquisiton of virtue; and contexts for the activities of friendship. Questions are raised finally about the theoretical implications of peer-grouping in old age. The cultivation of generational distinctiveness is seen as both a cause of and response to age segregation.

Lonely Women in a Friendship Club

Abstract Unattached women in their fifties and sixties who are lonely and in search of friendship tend to gravitate towards social clubs, set up to introduce people to potential friends. Such clubs require of their members social skills which are, unfortunately, often lacking. The women described here operate, furthermore, with concepts of friendship which make the establishment and maintenance of satisfactory relationships difficult. Friendship clubs, it appears, do not fulfil their promise; and women in search of friendship need help in developing more realistic attitudes to personal relationships.