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Conceptualising Occupation: an Ethnographic Study Of CONCEPTUALISING OCCUPATION: AN ETHNOGRAPHIC STUDY OF DAILY LIFE IN A GREEK TOWN SARAH KANTARTZIS A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Leeds Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2013 Abstract Occupation is understood within the discipline of occupational science and the profession of occupational therapy to be a particular kind of activity with links to health. However, there has been little theoretical work exploring the construction of the concept and understandings are largely dependent on the writings of Western academics writing in the English language. Situated in contemporary understandings of cultural relativity, local narratives and issues of power, and my own 30 year experience of living and working in Greece, this ethnographic study was developed to explore the construction of the concept of occupation in Greece. Over a 30 month period I observed and participated in both celebratory and mundane occupation within the context of a small town. I explored the nature of occupation through the shared and largely tacit understandings of what was usual everyday life. The understanding of occupation that was developed was of an ongoing multi- dimensional process. Supported by the transactional theory of John Dewey (1949), occupation as process was an integral part of all elements of the situation (incorporating transacting individual, social, temporal, spatial and climatic elements), and worked to maintain the ongoing balance of the situation. Three plots of occupation in the town were configured - maintaining the self-in-the-world, maintaining the family, and maintaining the social fabric – that tell of what people were working towards, wanting to maintain, considered desirable and valued, as shared narratives underpinning on-going everyday life. The findings support the need for situated research that can explore local understandings of occupation. They challenge the ongoing position evident in much of the literature that views the individual as an active, knowledgeable agent, and support the importance of the developing scholarship incorporating transactional theories in understanding of occupation (Cutchin & Dickie, 2013). They also demonstrate that occupation is the process of people’s engagement in the world and that health is not only expressed but also promoted through occupation. Acknowledgements In carrying out this study I have come to increasingly understand the transactional nature of occupation, to understand this study as a transactional process and myself as an essential element within it. My acknowledgements and thanks cannot therefore be limited to those people who were actively engaged in one way or another with the actual processes of the study, but also must go to the numerous people who through time and across space have been part of my life that has led to this point, and who therefore, knowingly or unknowingly were part of this study. However, first and foremost I would like to thank the people of Melissa for the possibility they gave me for living with them and participating in the daily life of the town. This study has been an extraordinary learning journey, with times both of great excitement but also of struggle. Throughout, my primary supervisor Prof. Matthew Molineux has empowered me to find the path and provided continual support for the journey. I consider it a great privilege to have had such a mentor and guide. I also would like to thank Sally Foster, Director of Studies, for expanding her many interests to include occupation, for her alternative perspective which enabled new understandings, and for her ongoing support. My thanks also to Virginia Dickie and Sissel Alsakar for their encouragement, interest and insights. Thank you also to fellow doctoral students for sharing the journey and particularly to Dikaios Sakellariou for many critical discussions and reflections. In Greece there are numerous people who have been part of this journey and whom I would like to thank. These include fellow ‘foreign wives’ and our endless discussions, beginning almost thirty years ago, where we endeavoured to understand, explain and work with the complexities of living in another language and world; many of those discussions formed the base of my early thinking around occupation in Greece. A special thanks to Lina Kostaki, a pioneer of occupational therapy in Greece, who supported my first professional steps in that country and to all my colleagues in Greece with whom I have worked over the years to continue to develop occupational therapy education and practice. Thank you for your vision, creativity, intelligence and incredible determination, it has been a privilege to work with you all and I hope that this study may be a useful addition to the development of our understandings of occupation. Thank you also to all my colleagues throughout Europe and our discussions around what occupation and occupational therapy is and may be, and particularly to Hanneke van Bruggen who had the vision to develop the European Network for Occupational Therapy in Higher Education (ENOTHE) where we could come together to work and be inspired. And finally I wish to thank my own family, to my parents, siblings and their families who throughout the years and in multiple ways encouraged curiosity, critique, change and diversity. Finally with much love to Harry, Katerina and Christos, because you believed I could and I would, and because you are my fellow travellers. “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference” (Robert Frost. The Road not Taken) Contents Prologue ...................................................................................................................................................... 13 Chapter 1: Introduction......................................................................................................................... 15 A Brief Introduction to Occupation .................................................................................................. 15 The Setting of the Study: Greece ........................................................................................................ 19 Purpose of the Study .............................................................................................................................. 22 Significance of the Study ....................................................................................................................... 23 Issues of Language .................................................................................................................................. 25 Occupation. ................................................................................................................................................ 25 Greek words and transliteration. ..................................................................................................... 26 Writing myself into the text. ............................................................................................................... 27 Organisation of the Thesis ................................................................................................................... 27 Chapter 2: Background .......................................................................................................................... 29 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 29 Occupation ................................................................................................................................................. 30 Exploring Activity, Individual and Context .................................................................................... 36 The transactional perspective of John Dewey. ........................................................................... 38 Exploring Action ...................................................................................................................................... 41 Agency and purposeful action. .......................................................................................................... 41 Shared understandings of action. ..................................................................................................... 42 Action, values and ethics. ..................................................................................................................... 44 Health and Everyday Life ..................................................................................................................... 46 Drawing Conclusions.............................................................................................................................. 52 Chapter 3: Research Design ................................................................................................................ 55 Aims of the Study ..................................................................................................................................... 55 Positioning Myself ................................................................................................................................... 56 Qualitative Research............................................................................................................................... 59 Theoretical underpinnings of the study. ......................................................................................
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