Cheng, L. orcid.org/0000-0002-6684-0999 (2025) “Am I in ‘suboptimal health’?”: the narratives and rhetoric in carving out the grey area between health and illness in everyday life. Sociology of Health & Illness, 47 (2). e70005. ISSN 0141-9889
Abstract
This paper examines the concept of ‘suboptimal health’ (subhealth, 亚健康), a term popularised by traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) professionals and widely used in public health discourses in China at the turn of the century. Despite criticisms of it being a commercial buzzword, subhealth provides a unique lens for individuals to articulate their health experiences concerning work and life pressures. Through virtual ethnography on Chinese social media such as Weibo and interviews, this study explores the usage and implications of subhealth in everyday life. It particularly focuses on how young Chinese people employ this concept to navigate and express health‐related issues. Drawing on Leder's concept of the lived body, as well as literature on illness narratives and the sociology of diagnosis and risk, the study argues that attention to the everyday narratives of subhealth could potentially open up a space for a greater range of narratives of embodiment and might even offer a space for collective critique in a context often dominated by individual responsibility narratives. In some cases, it also enables private and public narratives that critique lifestyle factors detrimental to health. Ultimately, this paper hints at the conceptualisation of “subhealth narratives” as a research framework.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2025 The Authors. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) |
Keywords: | Humans; Narration; China; Female; Health Status; Anthropology, Cultural; Male; Adult; Medicine, Chinese Traditional; Social Media |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Sociological Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 04 Feb 2025 15:08 |
Last Modified: | 04 Feb 2025 15:08 |
Published Version: | https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9566.70005 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Wiley |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1111/1467-9566.70005 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:222750 |