The Narrative Management of the Co-Existence of Contradictory Future Orientations Among Taiwanese Folk Healers

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  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 16. Alternative, Elective, and Innovative Healthcare

Abstract

Building from sociological research on illness experience, my paper foregrounds an understudied yet important aspect of illness experience: the co-existence of contradictory future orientations. That is, in the face of uncertainty caused by the onset of illness, people may both wish to reject uncertainty (and be cured) and learn to embrace uncertainty.
In order to examine how ill people manage the co-existence of contradictory future orientations through culturally meaningful narrative strategies, I draw upon interview data gathered from Taiwanese folk healers. Taiwanese folk healers often face a special kind of uncertainty---being afflicted by biomedically untreatable illnesses. Second, in the process of becoming socialized into those healing communities, Taiwanese folk healers become acutely aware of the co-existence of contradictory future orientations.
My research finds that Taiwanese folk healers use a narrative strategy that I call detour to manage the co-existence of contradictory future orientations. To begin with, they learn to reject uncertainty through internalizing a one-sided focus on somatic events. Then, they come to realize the pragmatic deficiency of the one-sided focus on somatic events that underlie the initial rejection of uncertainty. Finally, they learn to “really” embrace uncertainty by adopting so-called “ordinary” consciousness. That is, they learn to see the future orientation of rejecting uncertainty as simply a sensitizing concept, which entails learning to anticipate future events in an impartial manner.

Author

• Hwa-Yen Huang, State University of New Jersey-Rutgers