A moral ordering of supported care : a case study

An ethnomethodological approach is used to analyse the natural occurring talk between six support-workers and an allied-health professional as they go about their business of formulating a behavioural management plan for Jane, a woman with a severe intellectual and communication impairment. Using Sacks' (1974) Membership Categorisation Analysis, the thesis explores the way 'Jane' is categorised by the people at the meeting and how these people formulate their own membership to the categories 'SupportWorker' and 'Professional' through situational practices. The first of the three results chapters looks at accounts of choice as formulated during the meeting; the second examines the given-voice that is attributed 'Jane' by support workers; while the third, looks at assignment of the pronoun 'it' to describe Jane. The thesis concludes with a discussion of the findings and limitations of the investigation as they apply to ethnomethodology literature and the Social Model of Disability (Oliver, 1996).