Personal independence payment forms, a de/re/constructive reading: re/positioning claimants, social workers and social work practice ‘through’ policy discourse
Journal article
Cockain, A. 2021. Personal independence payment forms, a de/re/constructive reading: re/positioning claimants, social workers and social work practice ‘through’ policy discourse. The British Journal of Social Work. 52 (6), pp. 3191-3209. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcab221
Authors | Cockain, A. |
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Abstract | This article critically reads a Personal Independence Payment Claim Form. All agents implicated in this form (e.g. the Department of Work and Pensions, assessors, an Office Manager and health professionals) are contemplated although of central concern is the positioning of claimants—or the persons filling in the form on their behalf—and social workers, and the constructions of social work practice resulting from such positioning. This article investigates discourse in the form itself, the discourse claimants are obliged to supplement and the discursive formations this text registers/generates. To read this form, I distinguish between overt, declarative and manifest content and the covert, descriptive, latent, perhaps unintentional but violent content, accessing the latter through a symptomatic reading, which draws upon my interpretation of principles associated with deconstruction, critical discourse analysis, decentering and positioning. Conceiving of PIP-related practice as possessing the dynamic qualities of an ‘episode’, this article argues that although the text provides help with costs, a corollary or side-effect, is that claimants and social workers are made to inhabit problematic positions within discourse/practice. Textual analysis may, nevertheless, unsettle, and re/position and de/re/construct relations, thereby decentering institutionalised ways of being. |
Keywords | Deconstruction; Elective affinity; Personal Independence Payment Claim Form; Positioning; PIP claim form |
Year | 2021 |
Journal | The British Journal of Social Work |
Journal citation | 52 (6), pp. 3191-3209 |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
ISSN | 0045-3102 |
1468-263X | |
Digital Object Identifier (DOI) | https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcab221 |
Official URL | https://academic.oup.com/bjsw/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/bjsw/bcab221/6453836 |
Publication dates | |
Online | 06 Dec 2021 |
17 Sep 2022 | |
Publication process dates | |
Accepted | 26 Oct 2021 |
Deposited | 13 Dec 2021 |
Accepted author manuscript | License |
Output status | Published |
https://repository.canterbury.ac.uk/item/8zwvx/personal-independence-payment-forms-a-de-re-constructive-reading-re-positioning-claimants-social-workers-and-social-work-practice-through-policy-discourse
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