The Social Value of Drug Addicts: Uses of the Useless

by Merrill Singer, J Bryan Page

Overview

Drug users are typically portrayed as worthless slackers, burdens on society, and just plain useless—culturally, morally, and economically. By contrast, this book argues that the social construction of some people as useless is in fact extremely useful to other people. Leading medical anthropologists Merrill Singer and J. Bryan Page analyze media representations, drug policy, and underlying social structures to show what industries and social sectors benefit from the criminalization, demonization, and even popular glamorization of addicts. Synthesizing a broad range of key literature and advancing innovative arguments about the social construction of drug users and their role in contemporary society, this book is an important contribution to public health, medical anthropology, popular culture, and related fields.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781315417158
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	06/16/2016
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	248
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Merrill Singer, J Bryan Page

Table of Contents

Introduction; Chapter One Drugs, Race, and Gender in the Social Construction of Drug Consumers; Chapter Two Drug Users through the Ages; Chapter Three Representations of Addicts and the Construction of Prohibitions; Chapter Four Imagine That: Drug Users and Literature; Chapter Five Picture This; Chapter Six The Legal Construction of Drug Users; Chapter Seven Drug Users in Social Science; Conclusion;

Editorial Reviews

"In The Social Value of Drug Addicts: Uses of the Useless, Merrill Singer and J. Bryan Page provide a sweeping analysis of popular representations of drug use and drug users in U.S. culture...In making such an offering, Merrill Singer and J. Bryan Page continue to cement their legacy as scholars who have tried to talk sense to us about our society’s most harmful habits of social distinction."— Jennifer J. Carroll, American Anthropologist

From the Publisher