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This paper is a study of the discursive management of notions of change and continuity in interview talk. It presents selected short empirical examples from interviews with 22 Finnish baby-boomers, and discusses the methodological and theoretical issues that arise. Following a review of the major approaches to the study of age identity, the analytic intersection between qualitative gerontology and discursive psychology is explored. The analysis identifies how the frequent use of a ‘provisional continuity device’ enables speakers simultaneously both to acknowledge and to distance themselves from factual notions of physical or psychological lifespan change. The key methodological argument is that the discursive analysis of age-in-interaction cannot necessarily be achieved through the myopic micro-study of discursive strategies, but rather two suggestions are made. First, it is argued that analytically-anchored and rigorous discursive gerontology that both systematically draws on and contributes to the broad field of discursive research provides a means by which to test empirically post-modern conceptualisations of age identity. Second, it is suggested that analyses of age-talk in everyday and institutional settings provide an analytical and theoretical middle-ground between the macroversusmicro or ‘microfication’ debate in gerontology.

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Ageism and age discrimination in the labour market have been topics of scholarly interest since the early twentieth century. Today, in markedly different economic conditions, with increasingly globalised labour markets, the victories and failures of workers' movements, and the changing conditions of the European welfare state, the problem of unequal and negative treatment of older workers still prevails. This chapter looks at the phenomenon of age discrimination and ageism in the labour market from a socio-political perspective and draws attention to deciding factors in its emergence. We add to the individualistic and micro accounts adopted by psychological research (see Lev et al. 2018; Chap. 4, in this volume) and the meso level studies of organisation and work environment conditions (see Naegele et al. 2018; Chap. 5, in this volume) by examining the role of macrostructural processes and transformations to identify their link to the persistence of ageism and age discrimination in contemporary labour markets. First, we provide an overview of the most common conceptual understandings of ageism and age discrimination in employment. Second, we investigate the dynamics between the phenomena of ageism and age discrimination and a range of socio-political contexts, cultural settings, and legal and economic conditions. We then discuss the costs and consequences of age discrimination in employment, and examine various policy responses to these costs and consequences.