Awareness Vitalities: Editorial

Astrid Gynnild, University of Bergen, Norway Grounded theory go beyond time, place, and people. Thus, even in times of rapid change, we should expect that good grounded theories are relevant and applicable in their field for many decades. Perhaps the real test of grounded theory is that of its temporal endurance? This year, at the end of 2015, fifty years have passed since Glaser and Strauss’ first study where grounded theory principles were applied.  Their seminal book Awareness of Dying (1965) is thus a messenger of the long-term usability and influence of a rock solid...

Awareness of Dying Remains Relevant after Fifty Years

Tom Andrews, University of Cork, Ireland, Alvita Nathaniel, West Virginia University, USA Abstract This year is the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Awareness of Dying, one of four monographs that culminated from a six-year funded research program titled Hospital Personnel, Nursing Care and Dying Patients (Glaser, 1968). Written by Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss, Awareness of Dying (1965) was the first published study utilizing a new, groundbreaking research method. Glaser and Strauss termed this new method grounded theory because it was based upon data that...

The system was blinking red: Awareness Contexts and Disasters

Vivian B. Martin, Central Connecticut State University, USA Abstract The awareness context has been a source of inspiration for grounded theories for more than 50 years; yet little has been done to extend the theory beyond nursing and the medical field, and a few works on identity. This paper extends the awareness context by examining its role in several high-profile disasters, natural and man-made, where gaining a clear sense of what was going on was often blocked by poor information flow and general communication failures, interpersonal and technological. Selective...

The Practical Use of Awareness Theory

(A reprint of Chapter 14 in Awareness of Dying, first published 1965) Barney G. Glaser, PhD, and Anselm L. Strauss In this chapter we shall discuss how our substantive sociological theory has been developed in order to facilitate applying it in daily situations of terminal care by sociologists, by doctors and nurses, and by family members and dying patients. The application of substantive sociological theory to practice requires developing a theory with (at least) four highly interrelated properties. (As we have demonstrated in this book and will discuss explicitly in the...

Awareness of Dying Preface

This text is a reprint of the Preface of Awareness of Dying (1965) by Barney G. Glaser and Anselm L. Strauss PREFACE Once upon a time a patient died and went to heaven, but was not certain where he was. Puzzled, he asked a nurse who was standing nearby: “Nurse, am I dead?” The answer she gave him was: “Have you asked your doctor?” —Anonymous, circa 1964 Recently The New York Times reported: “VERY ILL CHILDREN TOLD OF DISEASE; Leukemia Patients at N.I.H. Not Shielded From Truth. . . . A child should always be told the truth, even when he has...

Perpetual Betterising: A Grounded Upgrading of Disruptive Innovation T...

Brett Chulu, National University of Science and Technology, Zimbabwe Abstract Clayton Christensen’s theory of disruptive innovation has a partial ancestry in classic grounded theory (CGT), anchored in the original methodological ideas of inductive theory-building, categorisation, formal theory, and modifiability. The locus of disruptive innovation theory resides at the nexus of sociology and economics. The inescapable sociological pedigree of this theory naturally lends itself to CGT analysis. Christensen’s theory cores out with a variable of perpetual betterising...