Confronting the Material Convoy in Later Life

Abstract

We adapt a metaphor from life course studies to designate the whole of one’s possessions, across time, as a convoy of material support. This dynamic collection of things supports daily life and the self, but it can also present difficulty in later life. To alleviate the purported burdens of the material convoy, a discourse has arisen that urges elders and their family members to reduce the volume of possessions. An analysis of 11 such possession management texts shows authors addressing two distinct audiences about elders’ need to downsize: family members and elders themselves. Authors who speak to family members do so with an urgent, unsentimental tone that echoes mainstream clutter-control advice about disorderly, overfull households. In texts for elders, the standard critique about consumption and unruly lives is gentler, more sensitive to the meaning of things, and underplays the emotions of divestment. There is stress on the responsibility to spare the next generation and control one’s legacy. These latter texts seem to respect that downsizing in later life symbolizes a narrowing of the life world.