“DÖNÜŞEN EBEVEYNLİK”: COVID-19 PANDEMİ SÜRECİNDE YAŞLI BİREYLERİN ÖZNELLİĞİ ÜZERİNE ANTROPOLOJİK BİR DEĞERLENDİRME
“TRANSFORMING PARENTING”: AN ANTHROPOLOGICAL EVALUATION OF THE SUBJECTIVITY OF OLDER ADULTS DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Summary/Abstract: This study explores the new forms of parenting that emerged toward older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic within a cultural and interpretive framework. It was observed that the protective attitudes directed at older adults throughout the pandemic often took the form of infantilizing and controlling practices, thereby undermining their subjectivity and autonomy. Findings from the field research indicate that this process not only impacted the health of older adults but also transformed their social positions and the ways in which they are perceived as subjects. The study critically questions how ostensibly protective approaches may function as mechanisms of domination, marginalizing the individual’s right to make autonomous decisions. The concept of “transforming parenting” is introduced to describe the reversal of parent–child roles during the pandemic, in which adult children increasingly imposed control over their aging parents, effectively positioning them in infantilized roles. This conceptualization provides an analytical lens through which to examine how stereotypical images of old age are socially reinforced and reproduced through dominant discourses. The study is based on ethnographic fieldwork carried out between 2020 and 2023 with university-educated individuals aged 65 and over, residing in the Kadıköy district of Istanbul. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and participant observation. Interviews conducted with a total of 40 participants were analyzed through a hermeneutic paradigm, aiming to understand how the experience of old age was redefined in the context of everyday life during the pandemic.

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