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Encyclopedia of Gerontology and Population Aging pp 1–3Cite as

Ageing and Detective Fiction

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Synonyms

Ageing and mystery fiction or crime fiction

Overview

Detective fiction is recognized as an important popular cultural space for the representation of older people and their concerns. According to Hepworth, detective fiction brings focus to dangers of ageing, depicting crimes in which frailty and the need of care make older characters vulnerable to manipulation and exploitation by others. Detective fiction, however, can encourage the reader to see older people beyond their stereotypes, as many mystery plots include the uncovering of hidden, and often unexpected, pasts of older characters that insist upon their individuality. Finally, detective fiction can challenge the dominant perception of older people as an inactive and unproductive subject by presenting older characters as competent detectives (Hepworth 1993). The serialization that is common in the genre also enables representation of main characters’ ageing process. Ian Ranking’s Rebus series, for instance, depicts the...

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References

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Filmography

  • Boukhrief N (dir) (2008) Cortex, les films du Worso, France

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Economics, Keio University, Tokyo, Japan

    K. Sako

Authors
  1. K. Sako
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to K. Sako .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Population Division, UN Dept of Economic Social Affairs Population Division, New York, NY, USA

    Danan Gu

  2. School of Medicine, Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, USA

    Matthew E. Dupre

Section Editor information

  1. School of Languages and Social Sciences, Aston University, Birmingham, UK

    Raquel Medina

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© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

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Cite this entry

Sako, K. (2019). Ageing and Detective Fiction. In: Gu, D., Dupre, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Gerontology and Population Aging. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69892-2_248-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69892-2_248-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69892-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69892-2

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Biomedicine and Life SciencesReference Module Biomedical and Life Sciences

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