We live, it’s been said, in a ‘risk society,’ a phrase most associated in academia with the work of Ulrich Beck and Anthony Giddens, but now pretty widely used by people who never heard of them. Of course life’s always been risky – and one could argue that in some ways people, at least the ones who are having public discussions of ‘risk,’ are as safe as people ever have been. I’ll leave it to others to explain why the swings are disappearing from the playgrounds, why kids can’t walk home three blocks by themselves, why it’s important, as I am constantly told by friends and family, that I know my risks and be tested for breast and a dozen other kinds of cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Are those the things that make us less ‘at risk’? Is that really why we are safer? Or is there something else at work here?
And why can I not seem to discuss this issue without constantly asking rhetorical questions?
HEALTH, RISK AND SOCIETY is a journal asking just these questions, or as it says on its home page: “Health Risk & Society is an international scholarly journal devoted to a theoretical and empirical understanding of the social processes which influence the ways in which health risks are taken, communicated, assessed and managed.” Andy Alaszewski, the editor of the journal, invited me to do an introduction to a special issue on the subject of pregnancy and birth. And Andy pointed out that my article was peppered with question marks, and that rhetorical questions are really not appropriate journal style. And yet, as we discussed the problem, he decided that my rhetorical questions were intrinsic to what I was saying and doing, so he let them stand.
What do you think? Is this an unnecessary rhetorical gimmick or flourish? Or do we need to keep asking ourselves these questions?
Click here to read my intro