Contemporary legends, rumours and collective behaviour: some neglected resources for medical sociology?

Abstract

This paper demonstrates the potential interest for the sociological understanding of medicine and health as social institutions of the qualitative study of collective behaviour. It takes, as a case study, the transformation of a widely-circulating contemporary legend,`The Missing Kidney' into a rumour in Nottingham, and elsewhere in the United Kingdom, in 1992. Possible methodological approaches and interpretations are considered, making particular use of the work of the French sociologist, Edgar Morin, and the`mass society' tradition of social theory. It is argued that neither provides an adequate understanding of the phenomenon and that medical sociologists should look to the Chicago tradition of work on collective behaviour, represented by Park and Blumer for inspiration. Using this, it is suggested that the Missing Kidney offers useful insights into lay thinking about professional work and its strategies for the informal social control of medicine.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Taxes

“…The meanings of such tax talk and its narrative functions in the context of everyday life are clearly not captured in the data recorded by survey researchers (cf. Dingwall ). The ideal data for our purposes would consist of transcripts of unobtrusively recorded conversations from a representative sample of social settings.…”

The rumouring of SARS during the 2003 epidemic in China

“…As for the situations that contribute to rumour proliferation, Shibutani (1966) notes that rumour is rife when institutionalised channels of communication break down or when they are no longer trusted by the public. At the social structural level, Turner (1964) points to four scenarios that lead to rumouring: when stable accommodations for the pursuit of everyday life are threatened; when the formal structure of a society no longer facilitates information circulation; when events occur that disrupt the normal understandings of daily routines; and when there is a strong shared incentive to use rumour to justify normatively prescribed collective behaviour (see also Dingwall 2001, Shaw and Woodward 2004). Prasad (1935: 5) describes a typical situation leading to the growth of rumour as one which: ‘(a) sets up an emotional disturbance; (b) is of an uncommon and unfamiliar type; (c) contains many aspects unknown to the individuals affected; (d) contains several unverifiable factors; (e) is of group interest’.…”

“…Rumours serve both as barometers of individual states of mind (Rosnow 1988), and as benchmarks for collective consciousness and group problem solving (Shibutani 1966, Bordia and DiFonzo 2002). The study of rumours, Dingwall (2001: 198) argues, has the potential to contribute to the sociology of health and illness by aiding our understanding of ‘lay health knowledge and beliefs and the situated basis of health‐relevant actions’. Likewise, as Wright and Nerlich (2009) demonstrate through their examination of rumours in circulation during the 2001 Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) crisis in Britain, rumours can be fruitfully analysed to shed light on the three types of psycho‐social epidemics – namely, an epidemic of fear, an epidemic of explanation, and an epidemic of action or proposed action – that Strong (1990) conceptualises subsequent to a major disease outbreak.…”

The Shag‐Band Menace: Tracing the Spread of a Contemporary Legend

“…Sociologists and folklorists view rumors and contemporary legends as indicators of public attitudes: rumors provide “improvised news” in uncertain conditions (Fine, Campion‐Vincent, and Heath ; Shibutani ); and the contents of legends reveal collective values and concerns (Brunvand ; Ellis ). These narratives are linked to the study of social problems, and seen as expressions of intergroup conflict or popular fears about social change (Best ; Campion‐Vincent ; Dingwall ; Fine ; Fine and Ellis ; Fine and Turner ). Interactionist sociologists have been particularly interested in rumors and legends as processes by which meanings are constructed.…”