COMING TO TERMS WITH ADVANCED BREAST-CANCER - BLACK WOMENS NARRATIVESFROM EASTERN NORTH-CAROLINA

This paper analyzes in-depth interviews with 26 black women who entere d the medical system in rural North Carolina with advanced breast dise ase. In these narratives, women draw on multiple sources of knowledge in order to come to terms with the diagnosis of breast cancer-a biomed ically-defined disease that they often refuse to acknowledge or accept . The analysis demonstrates how women relate the meaning of their indi vidual episodes of illness to one or more of the following sources of knowledge: an indigenous model of health emphasizing balance in the bl ood, popular American notions about cancer, and particular biomedical conceptions about breast disease and its treatment. These narratives p rovide an important window into the processes involved when individual s attempt to adapt personal experience to pre-existing cultural models , modify such models in the light of new information, and confront con flicts in their own interpretations of the meaning of a single episode of illness.