In search of lost time - Recall, projection and the phenomenology of addiction

Journal/Book: Time Soc. 1999; 8: 6 Bonhill Street, London, England EC2a 4Pu. Sage Publications Ltd. 99-117.

Abstract: This article presents data from research carried out among a sample of ex-opiate addicts. It argues that notions of temporality are important and hitherto unexamined features of the experience of addiction. For the individuals in this sample the state of addiction itself was described as a period of 'lost time' characterized by an inability to envisage the future. In it, individuals described amnesiac episodes in which they fell into a kind of 'narcotic slumber' which often lasted for the duration of their addiction career. The recovery from addiction was expressed as a regaining of a sense of temporality; a re-animation of the future and an 'awakening' from the previous state.

Note: Article Reith G, Univ Glasgow, Dept Sociol, Adam Smith Bldg, Glasgow G12 8RT, Lanark, SCOTLAND

Keyword(s): addiction; amnesia; memory; phenomenology; time

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