The Work-Related Roles and Identities of Older Canadians

Abstract

Western society highly values work, and is structured in such a way that people have to be involved in the paid labour force to live. Forms of work that are unpaid are often not recognized as “real” or “meaningful”. Consequently, populations that are not involved in the paid labour force can often be conceptualized as unproductive, which is often the case when discussing retired seniors in Canada. Despite the wide-spread social expectations that older people should be retired and the public programs that enable their retirement, ideals about the makeup of meaningful social roles have not changed very much, and so are applied to this population in a similar manner as to their younger counterparts. In other words, people are not generally seen as socially productive or as having meaningful social roles if they are not active in the paid labour force. For this reason, many sociologists have come to characterize older people as being a “roleless” population. If not characterized as roleless, “retired” in itself has also been classified as a role for elderly people, but the social function of a retired person has not been clearly defined either. Because of this, this Master’s thesis endeavoured to learn more about the work-related roles and identities of retired seniors. Through discussions with seniors about the different work activities they have been involved in throughout their lives, the social expectations projected onto them, and how they conceive their own roles and identities, this study unravels classic definitions of work, leisure, and retirement.