Illness and Narrative Identity: Rewriting the Self

Through this thesis, I intend to explore what sociologist Arthur Frank means when he describes illness as "a dangerous opportunity" (Frank, 1991, p. 1). It is my objective to more fully understand the lived experience of illness and how narrative can aid in transforming illness from tragic to transcendent. In doing so, it is first necessary to understand how illness differs from disease and how the medicalization of human health has displaced narrative from medical practice. Since illness is best understood as a lived experience, I will discuss how narrative is an exemplary means of communicating these experiences and restoring identity that is threatened by illness. Lastly, I will address how narrative might be more effectively utilized in the context of medicine, in respect to both patients and physicians. In this work, I propose that the opportunities posed by illness might be seized by actively exploring it by means of narrative expression. It is my hope that this thesis might contribute to extending the notion that narrative is a means of attributing greater meaning to illness and constructing a more complete, compassionate approach to medicine.