著者

白松 賢

出版者

日本教育社会学会

雑誌

教育社会学研究 (ISSN:03873145)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.74, pp.189-207, 2004-05-20

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Recently, many people have come to categorize "drugs" as deviance or a social problem. "Drugs" have been categorized in the public "drug" discourse by the rhetoric of endangerment, unreason, and with "atrocity tales." On the other hand, how is the "drug" discourse concerned with the interpretive activities of drug users, which are carried out locally? This paper discusses the relationship between the public "drug" discourse and the interpretive activities carried out in locally-managed interactive practices by the members. Specifically, using category-analyzed ethnography, this paper describes the process through which magic mushrooms have been categorized as a non-"drug" in the members' interactive practice : "what are magic mushrooms?" Therefore this paper argues about the type of interpretive resources that the public discourse has used in the process. The following conclusions are reached : (1) Through the interaction between the people who consider the ingestion of magic mushrooms to be a "criminal act" or "drug" use, and those who dislike the former, users have categorized magic mushrooms as non-"drug" by using categories such as "legal" and "natural." (2) In everyday discourse, by placing more importance on their experiences than on the public discourse, the users use the public discourse and "atrocity tales" as interpretive resources in order to categorize. (3) Although the categories of "natural" versus "chemical" entails the risk of being disproved, this possibility, which might have shaken the beliefs and local knowledge, has been moved aside by resolve and self-preservation work, using explanations such as these were cases when magic mushrooms were used improperly. Finally, the author cites the methodological possibility of category-analyzed ethnography. For example, there is a lengthy discussion of the experiences of a group of magic mushroom users showing how the "drug" discourse combines with members' folklore into "local cultures." Further arguments are needed by conducting various fieldwork focusing on the everyday discourse of users.