The aim of this paper is to review the social constructionist view of age and ageing that emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It begins with a general consideration of social constructionism as an epistemological framing of the world, before turning to its use in social gerontology. It considers two distinct social constructionist approaches treating later life as a social reality: (a) as a structural consequence of the rise of the modern state and its organisation of the labour market and (b) as a consequence of shifting cultural and social representations. Arguing that the earlier more structuralist accounts have gradually become overshadowed by concerns over age as identity, socially constructivist approaches now place as much emphasis upon the social representation of age as on its social-structural organisation. The paper then reviews the costs and benefits of social constructionism in general and its becoming a key part in the study of ageing. Its benefits arise from drawing attention to the salience of the cultural and the social in fashioning age and ageing and thereby advancing the sociology of later life. At the same time, social constructionist approaches to old age risk neglecting an other personal and social reality arising from corporeal decline and fear of the body-to-come. The paper concludes by noting how, whether approaching ageing and old age as natural kinds or as human kinds, adopting biological or sociological methodologies, all such methods privilege the externality of age – whether as a social or a biological fact. What is not captured by either is the problematic internality of age. What might be called the subjectivity of age will remain a topic for cultural representation, beyond the methods of both biological and social science.

本文的目的是回顾 20 世纪 70 年代末和 80 年代初出现的关于年龄和老龄化的社会建构主义观点。它首先对社会建构主义作为世界的认识论框架进行一般性考虑，然后转向其在社会老年学中的应用。它考虑了两种不同的社会建构主义方法，将晚年生活视为一种社会现实：（a）作为现代国家及其劳动力市场组织兴起的结构性结果；（b）作为文化和社会表征转变的结果。社会建构主义方法认为，早期结构主义的解释逐渐被对年龄作为身份的关注所掩盖，现在社会建构主义方法既重视年龄的社会表征，也重视年龄的社会结构组织。然后，本文回顾了社会建构主义的总体成本和收益，及其成为老龄化研究的关键部分。它的好处在于引起人们对文化和社会在塑造年龄和老龄化方面的显着性的关注，从而推进晚年社会学的发展。与此同时，社会建构主义对待老年的方法有可能忽视由于肉体衰退和对未来身体的恐惧而产生的其他个人和社会现实。本文最后指出，无论是把衰老和老年视为自然类型还是人类，采用生物学或社会学方法论，所有这些方法都优先考虑年龄的外部性——无论是作为社会事实还是生物学事实。两者都没有捕捉到年龄问题的内在性。