Aging Angry

Fear of anger can ultimately be as destructive as expressed rage, fomenting social isolation, injustice, and misunderstanding. In Aging Angry: Making Peace with Rage, Amanda Smith Barusch argues that now, more than ever, it is time for older adults to turn toward anger rather than denying or avoiding it. By taking anger seriously, we can neutralize its destructive potential and harness its energy and wisdom for personal and social change.Barusch draws upon the experiences of hundreds of older adults and a wealth of literary and academic sources to empower readers with new understanding of anger's sources, dynamics, and possibilities. Topics range from anger and race in the United States to mass violence committed by older adults to aged activists who have changed our world.In rich and insightful prose, accompanied throughout by powerful case studies, Aging Angry forcefully demonstrates that anger--and even rage--can be transformative.

Drawing upon the great philosophers, religion, psychology, and her interviews with older adults and experts, Barusch comprehensively analyzes anger-an emotion often stigmatized, especially among older women, and relatively invisible in the field of gerontology. Her own personal experience with anger upon her retirement fueled her interest in the paradox faced by older adults of living forward while looking backward, which often underlies their anger. When older adults realize that love and anger can coexist and turn their anger into activism, they experience personal growth and oftentimes become activists for social change., Jump-started by her own unexpected and shocking experience of ageism in academe, Amanda Barusch's Aging Angry is eminently reasonable for a book about anger, the righteous, intelligent kind that surfaces as we grow older and are likely to encounter and observe more injustice-especially toward older adults, women, people with disabilities or low incomes, and later-life activists who fight the power. Barusch's fascinating interviews with 'grumpy, cantankerous, and obstreperous elders' deepen our interest in using this primary emotion effectively, to heal our nations of the common curse of ageism and improve the world., With wisdom, wit, and style, Amanda Barusch affirms anger as an emotion to be embraced constructively as we age into later adulthood. From surveying world history and mythology to psychology and neuroscience, Dr. Barusch describes the nuanced nature of anger's relationship with the human experience. She draws on lessons learned through interviews to provide a roadmap for older adults to activate their anger to live fuller lives and improve the social good. In doing so, Dr. Barusch's book arrives as a fresh and necessary tome to challenge and inspire all of us to reconsider the positive role and utility of anger in our lives., In Aging Angry, distinguished gerontologist, Amanda Barusch, confronts her own justified fury at having been pushed into unwanted university retirement by diving into original research on gray rage, while also providing a sobering survey of anger across history, philosophy and culture. She argues that the smoldering anger associated with late life, rather than an unsightly negative emotion to be reproached, often stems from legitimate causes. By leaning into one's consternation, she contends, we may harness our ire with productive purposes, from resolving family estrangement to protesting injustice, like the Raging Grannies. Barusch inverts the old clich'e of Boston politics, as if she'd counsel, 'Don't get even, get mad!' And make worthwhile change., Superbly researched with stories interwoven to amplify our understanding of anger through multiple lenses: historical, cultural, psychological, and philosophical. Additionally, Barusch provides a highly personal perspective, as her experience of being pushed out of academia provided the impetus to explore anger with a gerontological twist. This work fills a gap in knowledge about an understudied and stereotypical approach to anger and its various manifestations. It's a clear and compelling read!

Amanda Smith Barusch, PhD, is Professor Emeritus at the University of Otago, New Zealand, and the University of Utah. She is known for her insightful narrative inquiries into the lives of older adults. Barusch served as Editor-in-Chief for the Journal of Gerontological Social Work (2009-2014) and is Deputy Editor-in-Chief for the Australasian Journal on Ageing. She serves on the Advisory Board of Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work Journal and is a fellow in the Gerontological Society of America.