Biographic Strategies of Greek Women with Breast Cancer: From the “Injured” to the “Contributing” Body

Abstract

This paper is based on a disciplinary qualitative research, grounded on fourteen biographical-narrative interviews with Greek women, experiencing breast cancer and mastectomy. These women have eventually participated in solidarity groups of self-help and voluntary action and describe the multiple ways they have coped with this new "alarm situation' that emerged in their biographies. The main purpose of the article is to understand and interpret the practises they employed, in as much as they record breast cancer as a turning point with respect to emotions, social relationships and activities. The main results of the research reveal that these particular women, members of a larger social group, tend to produce a special form of embodiment and politicization. This results in a complex, painful and struggling renegotiation of a social identity and a rather new form of relationships with the self and the significant others. The management of the disease -and the potential social stigma or everyday negativity -ultimately leads to a redefinition of the basic life values, within the framework of an energetic and combative, self-reflective project with an often contradictory content.