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SOS and the Retelling of Suicide

University of Pennsylvania, USApettym{at}caster.ssw.upenn.edu

Participants in a self-help group for suicide ‘survivors’– that is, people who have lost loved ones to suicide death – seek to recover and produce narratives of their experience. Based on a micro-study drawn from the author’s personal journals and an analysis of the national organization’s printed materials, this article explores how a particular view of the ‘self’ functions in a group where stories of tragedy are told. An interpretive analysis of the self-help process, as experienced in an SOS (Survivors of Suicide) group, suggests that the group’s methods of moving toward mutual understanding and recovery rely on a construction of the ‘self’ having experienced this particular loss. Descriptions of the group’s structure and of social interactions are drawn from observations made by the author who was a participant in the group.

Key Words: psychiatry and suicide • self-help and suicide • Survivors of Suicide

Health:, Vol. 4, No. 3, 288-308 (2000)
DOI: 10.1177/136345930000400303


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