Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO The narrative dimension of substance use Sveinung Sandberg, University of Oslo Sébastien Tutenges, University of Aarhus

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO The nature of narratives A story is a form of discourse that “has a temporal dimension. The story has a beginning, middle, and an ending […]. The story is held together by recognizable patterns of events” (Sarbin 1986: 3). A story is “a skeletal description of the fundamental events” (Franzosi 1998: 519], which “represents cause and effect relations through its sequencing of events” (Polletta et al 2011). Stories organize our experiences and give them meaning. They draw selectively on experiences, make a point, and reflect the identity or self-story of the narrator. In linguistic theory narratives have a well-formed structure. However, because listeners know similar stories, in actual talk they do not need this to be effective. Sometimes a narrator only needs to hint at it for the listener to ‘hear’ the full story.

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO Narrative criminology AgencyStructure Unified Narrative psychology: Creative and artful construction of a coherent narrative Cultural structuralism: The mirroring of a coherent and pre-authored narrative Fragmented Ethnomethodology: Strategic shifts between different, sometimes competing, narratives Postmodernism: Mirroring the multitude of narratives in a complex and chaotic order of discurse

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO Narratives of substance use Thomas: Cannabis has changed my personality. Towards becoming more free and less obsessed with social rules, patterns. I was really afraid of being different and dressing alternatively, being noticed. Sveinung: It's the substance itself which brings this about? Thomas: It can just as well be the actual thought of freedom. In that it is a subculture with a strong view of the law and rules, many anarchists. People often become different politically, more aware of themselves and the world in a different way. There has always been the possibility that I could be arrested. I have been one of the others, not felt like a part of society.

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO The hidden narrative Sveinung: To chase the optimal high, is that common? Daniel: […] Time just floats. That’s the same about everything, everything you see and do, you come to a certain “supreme” [in English] superiority, see? If you manage to keep it there. You don’t manage to keep it there. I understand your concept, I know what you are trying to get at. It’s like a spiritual experience. Like the Indians, they used hashish to come to, to get to …. Sveinung: Another place? Daniel: Another place. Yes, generally. When you do amphetamines for many days, so many weeks, then it’s not the same anymore. Cause amphetamines is chemical, so it’s not the same. […]

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO How can they be analysed? Narratives analysis typically treat stories as retrospective constructs that rework past events for present purposes. Little attention is given to how stories connect people with the future, pointing ahead and inspiring conduct. Substance can be enactments of narratives and people sometimes use substances to realise particular stories about the self. Stories create action and events because people act in accordance with the stories that they are familiar with and that prevail in their social environment. Thus, we need to elaborate the cognitive, justificatory and institutional mechanisms by which narratives promote harmful action.

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO Building a repertoire of drinking stories Sarah: We write in the diary who got most drunk, who slept with who, and all the stuff we did […]. Tine: It will be fun one day to look back and say ‘oh yeah, we did that too’, and ‘that was just so much fun’. Sarah: And I mean, it will be a whole year before we can come back to Sunny Beach. Natasha: So now we’ve got some memories. Sarah: Also, because sometimes you can’t really remember everything you did, but the others will remember it. And it’s fun too to sit together and write it all down. Natasha: With this [diary], we can make it through an entire school year […].

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO The importance of “having tried it” Morten: “We were a group of friends that had certain opinions, and wanted to try the same stuff as the musicians we liked, it was kind of exclusive.” Mads: “I had thought about for more than a year. I read a lot about it on the internet, did a lot of research. I already had a pipe. Then I bought two grams of a friend, went home and had ‘the time of my life’”. Jonas: “I had so many opinions about the drug that I wanted to try for myself, in order to know what I was talking about”. Signe: “I was happy about having done it, to be able to say that I’d done it. That’s the way it works”.

Sveinung Sandberg. ISS, UiO Conclusion Alcohol: A good drinking story involved a large intake of alcohol combined with incidents such as accidents, passing out, or engaging in unusual or daring behavior. Cannabis: Use of cannabis was a good story per see for many, but for those who used a lot it, it had to be combined with unexpected behavior such as eating or laughing a lot or experiencing alternative states of consciousness. Both: Good substance use stories break with the conventional. They are also closely linked to self-narratives of “having lived”. Most importantly: Stories is a key motivating factor for substance use and should be studies as such. Substance use is enactment of stories.