Biographical Forms and Narrative. Theoretical-Epistemological Approaches and Analytical Expressions for the Study of Women's Experiences of Breast Cancer

Abstract

This article is a theoretical-epistemic and methodological reflection on biographical forms within the framework of a research project focused on the transit through breast cancer of women living in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires in the second decade of the 21st century. The question of the experience of illness led us to investigate the biographical and its heuristic potential in working with narratives for socio-anthropological studies of health. In order to do so, we focused on the process of interlocution with 25 women from popular and middle class sectors, between 26 and 75 years old. We emphasize the social dimension of all subjectivity, considering the dialogical and ethical nature of working with biographical forms. We also reflect on the process of narrative configuration in the research practice.

For the empirical analysis, we recover the configurative-temporal capacity and the place of biographical rupture in the illness process. At the same time, we pay attention to aspects that participate and operate in the narrative process as an attempt to give an account of oneself: the moment in which the interlocution takes place in relation to the times and therapeutic instances of the illness; the horizons of expectations; the ways of thinking about the origin and/or causes of the diagnosis; and the place of the experience as a catalyst of other biographically significant events.