Paula Nicole Eugenio

In this paper, I explore how ageing people experience a dehumanizing gaze that transforms them into objects of sympathy or uselessness or helplessness, which impacts their self-image, emotional state, and social connections. I do this through Jean-Paul Sartre’s concept of the gaze and Simone Weil’s concept of attention vis-à-vis the alienating experiences of older adults. From Sartre, I show how the gaze functions as a source of social exclusion for elderly people, while Weil’s concept of attention presents an opposing way to handle the objectifying gaze. I establish a dialogue between the two philosophers to demonstrate our ethical duty when interacting with older adults through attention as a validation of the natural dignity of ageing people while understanding their pain as a demand for justice, love, and compassion. The dialogue operates through dialectical means because Sartre’s phenomenology shows how objectification risks occur through the closed gaze, and Weil’s ethics of attention reveals the opposing practice of open gaze, yet these two do not produce a unified solution. This paper contributes to ageing studies through the development of a phenomenological and ethical framework to understand the ageing body while advocating for improved ways to interact with elderly people.