Bringing together essays by nineteen respected scholars, this volume approaches dementia from a variety of angles, exploring its historical, psychological, and philosophical implications. The authors employ a cross-cultural perspective that is based on ethnographic fieldwork and focuses on questions of age, mind, voice, self, loss, temporality, memory, and affect.

Dementia-near-death and "life itself" -- The borderlands of primary care : physician and family perspectives on "troublesome" behaviors of people with dementia -- Negotiating the moral status of trouble : the experiences of forgetful individuals diagnosed with no dementia -- Diagnosing dementia : epidemiological and clinical data as cultural text -- The biomedical deconstruction of senility and the persistent stigmatization of old age in the United States -- Genetic susceptibility and Alzheimer's disease : the penetrance and uptake of genetic knowledge -- Coherence without facticity in dementia : the case of Mrs. Fine -- Creative storytelling and self-expression among people with dementia -- Embodied selfhood : an ethnographic exploration of Alzheimer's disease -- Normality and difference : institutional classification and the constitution of subjectivity in a Dutch nursing home -- Divided gazes : Alzheimer's disease, the person within, and death in life -- Being a good råojin : senility, power, and self-actualization in Japan.