Old persons’ bodily interaction with media in nursing homes

Old persons in nursing homes suffer from complex diseases, pain and the loss of physical functions and memory. They embody the notion of ‘deep old age’, the ‘fourth age’, as recipients of personal care, medicine, meals and organised activities. People in nursing homes are also part of a society in which media have become a regular feature of everyday life. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Danish nursing homes, this article explores old persons’ subjective interaction with media technologies and material objects. Embodiment and agency are central analytical concepts for understanding residents’ use of media artefacts when the body is in pain and loses functionality. With theories of domestication and biographical situation, this article reveals how media are important for residents in making an institutional dwelling ‘their home’. Media seem to bridge the gap between institutionalisation and a long life’s preferences and participation in social and cultural worlds. This article forms part of ‘Media and the Ageing Body’ Special Issue