Overview

Editors:

Grazyna Zajdow
School of History, Heritage and Society
Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia

Jo Lindsay
School of Social and Political Inquiry
Monash University, Melbourne, Australia

Increasing overconsumption of alcohol and recreational drugs in Australia is a major health issue. Contradictions in public policies and mixed messages from the media abound, leaving substance awareness education in a state of remote objectivity.

The aim of this special issue is to facilitate better understanding of the social constructs surrounding drug use and abuse in the post-industrial era, including the inherent paradoxical nature of drug and alcohol use.

Sociology, Recreational Drugs and Alcohol seeks to inform policy makers, researches and professionals specialising in drug and alcohol use, through case studies, in-depth fieldwork and sound research approaches.

Highlights include:

• Role of drugs and alcohol in identity formation and identity escape
• Social expectations and public policy creating mixed messages about consumption
• Intoxication for pleasure vs. addiction
• Expanding the narrow definitions of substance use and desire
• Normalisation of drug use in youth and its implications for educational programs
• Examination of substance abuse and its contradictions in the life of a well-known Australian athlete

This is essential reading for sociology researchers, lecturers and students, public policy makers, substance abuse counsellors and educators, as well as other professionals specialising in drug and alcohol use.

Table of Contents

Editorial: Sociology, recreational drugs and alcohol
Grazyna Zajdow, Jo M Lindsay
The long reaction against the wowser: The prehistory of alcohol deregulation in Australia
Robin Room
Normalisation of recreational drug use of among young people: Evidence about accessibility, use and involvement in drug using networks
Hannah Wilson, Joanne Bryant, Martin Holt, Carla Treloar
The ‘sorry addict': Ben Cousins and the construction of drug use and addiction in elite sport
Kate Seear, Suzanne Fraser
‘Muzzas' and ‘Old Skool Ravers': Ethnicity, drugs and the changing face of Melbourne's dance party/club scene
Christine Siokou, David Moore, Helen Lee
Images of the desire for drugs
John Fitzgerald
‘It blasted me into space': Intoxication and an ethics of pleasure
Grazyna Zajdow
More than one and less than many: Materialising hepatitis C and injecting drug use in self-help literature and beyond
Suzanne Fraser