Article published in:
Narratives as Social Practice in Organisational Contexts
Edited by Dorien Van De Mieroop, Jonathan Clifton and Stephanie Schnurr
[Narrative Inquiry 32:1] 2022
► pp. 86–107

Small stories in short interactions

The functions of narratives in care home worker interactions

| Vienna University of Economics and Business
The study investigates story-telling in naturally-occurring interactions in a care home for older people with dementia in England. Stories were told by a range of discourse participants and varied from more relationally-oriented anecdotes occurring as part of small talk to more transactionally-oriented narratives embedded into work routines. The main aim of the study was to explore narratives as social practice in the interactions of the care staff and to discover what functions they perform in their workplace practice and more generally in that of the care home. The analysis focused principally on two primarily work-oriented narrative types: “working stories” and “narratives of professional practice”. The findings were that such stories performed a range of key functions in the professional practice of the care givers, in particular problem-solving, knowledge-sharing and critical evaluation.
Keywords: narrative, small stories, elder care, dementia, care homes, nursing homes
Article outline
  • Introduction
    • Approaches to narrative
    • Narratives in professional practice
  • Data and methodology
  • Analysis and findings
    • Working stories
    • Narratives of professional practice
  • Discussion
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Transcription Conventions
  • References
Published online: 23 June 2021
https://doi.org/10.1075/ni.20064.koe
References
Ainsworth-Vaughn, N.
(1998) Claiming Power in Doctor-Patient Talk. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Backhaus, P.
(2011) Communication in Elder Care: A cross-cultural perspective. Continuum.Google Scholar
(2017) Care Communication: Making a Home in a Japanese Eldercare Facility. Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bamberg, M., & Georgakopoulou, A.
(2008) Small stories as a new perspective in identity analysis. Text & Talk, 28(3), 377–397. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Davis, B. H., & Maclagan, M.
(2018) Narrative and ageing: exploring the range of narrative types in dementia conversation. European Journal of English Studies, 22(1), 76–90. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Davis, B. H., Maclagan, M., & Shenk, D.
(2014) Exploring communicative interactions between visitors and assisted-living residents with dementia. In H. E. Hamilton & S. C. Wen-ying (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Health Communication (pp. 344–361). Routledge.Google Scholar
De Fina, A.
(2006) Group identity, narrative and self-representations. In A. De Fina & D. Schiffrin, (Eds.), Discourse and Identity (pp. 351–375). Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2009) Narratives in interview – The case of accounts; For an interactional approach to narrative genres. Narrative Inquiry, 19(2), 233–258. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
De Fina, A., & Georgakopoulou, A.
(2015) Introduction. In A. De Fina & A. Georgakopoulou (Eds.), The Handbook of Narrative Analysis (pp. 1–17). Wiley Blackwell. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Eggins, S., & Slade, D.
(2004) Analysing Casual Conversation. Equinox Publishing Ltd (First published by Cassell in 1997).Google Scholar
Engeström, Y., & Middelton, D.
(1996) Cognition and Communication at Work. Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Fasulo, A., & Zucchermaglio, C.
(2008) Narratives in the workplace: Facts, fictions, and canonicity. Talk & Text, 28(3), 351–376. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Georgakopoulou, A.
(2007) Small Stories, Interaction and Identities. John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Grainger, K.
(2004) Communication and the institutionalized elderly. In J. F. Nussbaum & J. Coupland (Eds.), Handbook of Communication and Aging Research, 2nd Ed. (pp. 479–497). Laurence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
Hamilton, H.
(2008) Narrative as snapshot: Glimpses into the past in Alzheimer’s discourse. Narrative Inquiry, 18(1), 53–82. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Holmes, J.
(2005) Story-telling at work: A complex discursive resource for integrating personal, professional and social identities. Discourse Studies, 7(6), 671–700. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2006) Workplace narratives, professional identity and relational practice. In A. De Fina, D. Schiffrin & M. Bamberg (Eds.), Discourse and Identity (pp. 166–187). Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Hydén, L.-C.
(2018) Entangled Narratives: Collaborative Storytelling and the Re-Imagining of Dementia. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Jefferson, G.
(1978) Sequential aspects of story-telling in conversation. In J. Schenkein (Ed.), Studies in the Organization of Conversational Interaction (pp. 219–248). Academic Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Koester, A.
(2006) Investigating Workplace Discourse. Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Labov, W.
(1972) Language in the Inner City. Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Lave, J., & Wenger, E.
(1991) Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lenchuk, I., & Swain, M.
(2010) Alise’s small stories: indices of identity construction and of resistance to the discourse of cognitive impairment. Language Policy, 9(1), 9–28. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lubinski
(1981) Language and Ageing: An environmental approach to intervention. Topics in Language Disorders, 1(4), 89–98. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Mental Capacity Act (MCA): Mental Capacity Act 2005 at a glance
(2009) https://​www​.scie​.org​.uk​/mca​/introduction​/mental​-capacity​-act​-2005​-at​-a​-glance (accessed February 2021)
Ochs, E., & Capps
(2001) Living Narrative. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Österholm, J. H., & Hydén, L.-C.
(2018) Autobiographical occasions in assessment meetings involving persons with dementia. Qualitative Social Work, 17(1), 41–64. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Orr, J. E.
(1990) Sharing knowledge, celebrating identity: Community memory in a service culture. In D. Middleton, & D. Edwards, (Eds.), Collective Remembering (pp. 169–189). Sage.Google Scholar
Plum, G. A.
(1988) Text and contextual conditioning in spoken English: a genre-based approach. PhD Thesis: University of Sidney.Google Scholar
Ramanathan-Abbott, V.
(1994) Interactional differences in Alzheimer’s discourse: An examination of AD speech across two audiences. Language in Society, 23(1), 31–58. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Schegloff, E.
(1997) ‘Narrative analysis’ thirty years later. Journal of Narrative and Life History, 71(1–4), 9–106.Google Scholar
Schiffrin, D.
(1990) The management of co-operative self during argument: The role of opinions and stories. In A. D. Grimshaw (Ed.), Conflict Talk (pp. 241–259). Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Small, J., Geldart, K., Gutman, G., & Scott, M. A. C.
(1998) The discourse of self in dementia. Ageing and Society, 18(3), 291–316. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Small, J., Chan, S. M., Drance, E., Globerman, J., Ho, L., Hulko, W., O’Connor, D., Perry, J., & Stern, L.
(2017) Verbal and nonverbal turn-taking actions of care staff and residents in linguistically diverse long-term care settings. In C. Plejert, C. Lindholm & R. W. Schrauf (Eds.), Multilingual Interaction and Dementia (pp 133–147). Multilingual Matters. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Sowińska, A., & Sokół, M.
(2019) “Luckily, she’s alive”: Narratives of vicarious experience told by Polish doctors. Journal of Pragmatics, 1521, 76–88. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Sperry, L., & Sperry, D.
(1996) Early Development of narrative skills. Cognitive Development, 111, 443–465. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Tatzer, V. C.
(2019) Narratives-in-action of people with moderate to severe dementia in long-term care: Understanding the link between occupation and identity. Journal of Occupational Science, 26(2), 245–257. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Van De Mieroop, D.
(2019) Implying identities through narratives of vicarious experience in job interviews. Journal of Pragmatics, 1521, 61–75. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2021) The Narrative Dimensions Model and an exploration of various narrative genres. Narrative Inquiry, 31(1), 4–27. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Vásquez, C.
(2009) Examining the role of face work in a workplace complaint narrative. Narrative Inquiry, 19(2), 259–279. CrossrefGoogle Scholar