O zmienności pojęć: społeczna historia starości

The article is not a historical but a sociological presentation of the “history of the senility”. It traces the transformations of definitions of the old age and elderly in the context of the social history of the state. Historical presentation aims to clarify present culture, namely roots of the images of ageing. At the basis of this paper there lies the assumption that all the notions, including political ones, are cultural constructs.