Navigating the Pandemic in India: Voices of Older Adults and Intersectional Realities

This book weaves together intersectional threads that underlie the experiences of older men and women in India during the Covid-19 pandemic. While older adults were considered particularly vulnerable to the scourge of the pandemic, there is scant first-hand evidence about how they understood the pandemic and how they were affected by it. Data about the effects of the virus on this population, as communicated by the government and the press, resulted in reductive/problematic narratives that shaped and colored their lives. The intersectional lens used in the book highlights the differential impacts of poverty, (dis)ability, gender, civil status, and health status on the experiences of older adults during the pandemic. This book brings forth first-person narratives of older adults navigating the Covid-19 pandemic in India. It is a handy ready reckoner for mental health and medical professionals, students in qualitative research methods, psychology, social work, geriatric medicine, health and public health, and public administration. The book's findings are provocative and generate curiosity about the lives and experiences of an age category seldom focused on.