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Hindi Research Article
Exploring Legitimacy and Authority in the Construction of Truth Regarding Personal Experiences of Drug Use
N Kiepek*
School of Occupational Therapy, Dalhousie University, Ontario, Canada
- Corresponding Author:
- N Kiepek
Assistant Professor, School of Occupational Therapy
Dalhousie University, Ontario Canada
Tel: 902-494-2609
E-mail: niki.kiepek@gmail.com
Received date: Feb 17, 2016; Accepted date: Mar 26, 2016; Published date: Apr 03, 2016
Citation: Kiepek N (2016) Exploring Legitimacy and Authority in the Construction of Truth Regarding Personal Experiences of Drug Use. J Addict Res Ther 7:273. doi:10.4172/2155-6105.1000273
Copyright: © 2016 Kiepek N. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Objectives: This research explored drug use from the perspectives of individuals who recreationally used one or more substances on a daily basis and had never attended addiction-related counselling or a mutual support group. The purpose of the research was to identify the ways that narrative accounts were discursively structured to enact, confirm, legitimate, reproduce, or challenge the concept of addiction.
Methods: The methodology involved a critical analysis of discourse, drawing on personal accounts of drug use that were elicited using discursive narrative strategies.
Results: The finding demonstrated that narrative accounts were constructed in relation to dominant discourses in the North American context. Efforts to refute dominant discourses can be viewed as a response to risks associated with self-disclosure of subjugated positions. The findings presented in this paper pertain to the ways in which research participants adopted indirect discursive practices that challenged distinctions between legal, socially sanctioned drug use (namely, medications) and illegal, socially unsanctioned drug use. Drawing in particular discursive strategies, the research participants blur the lines between categorization of drugs and drug-related practices as healthy or unhealthy, moral or immoral, socially acceptable or socially acceptable. Overall, the findings demonstrate that the research participants challenged dominant discourses that position illicit drug use and distribution as being socially unacceptable.
Conclusion: This research uncovers discursive practices of power, authority, legitimacy, dominance, and inequality in relation to drug-related policy, research, and education. The findings offer an alternative interpretation to narrative accounts that might otherwise be interpreted as ego defense mechanisms.
