By: MIR AZAD KALAM, SAPTAMITA PAL
This article examines social age as a culturally constructed and relational dimension of aging in rural eastern India. Based on semi‑structured interviews with 28 couples from diverse socio‑economic backgrounds, the study shows how age is interpreted and assigned through life‑course transitions, kinship roles, and embodied conditions rather than through chronological measures. Key markers such as marriage, parenthood, and grandparenthood reorganize individuals’ status within household hierarchies, while age estimation relies largely on personal and collective memory in contexts with limited formal documentation. The findings highlight strong gender asymmetries: women experience earlier social aging due to reproductive labour and caregiving responsibilities, whereas men’s aging is tied more closely to economic productivity. Physically demanding work and economic precarity further accelerate embodied aging, revealing intersections of class and corporeality. The study argues that social age offers a more contextually meaningful framework for understanding aging and calls for culturally attuned approaches in demographic research and policy design.
