Being an Addict and Healing: Narratives and Practices in A Gospel Rehabilitation Center

Abstract

As a social problem, addiction is especially troublesome in the southwestern border areas of China. This research explores how they became addicts and how to deal with it based on six months of ethnographic research in a gospel rehabilitation center in Yunnan. In rationality analysis and discussion, personal choices of drug users arc often held accountable. However > it is necessary to take the geographic factor and historical background into consideration when reflecting on their way of being addicted. Besides? this study would > through personal narratives of drug addicts? attempt to introduce the irrationality factor of desire to analyze from the perspective of the subjects how their drug use experience is related to the society through desires. And then, by using participant observation of their daily practices in the center, this study makes an in-depth exploration of how such desires arc handled through healing treatment at the Gospel Rehabilitation Center. And how they through healing practices to realize rebirth.