PRAIRIE VIEW, Texas (September 15, 2020) – According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an estimated 20 percent of adults in the United States live with chronic pain. That’s more than 50 million people seeking chronic pain treatment regularly. The majority are adults living in poverty and those with public health insurance. Unfortunately, chronic pain spans the full spectrum of the population.
Huell (right) maneuvers Erdely (left) while she delivers a narrative about pain. Photo credit: Jay Allison.
Prairie View A&M University (PVAMU) Associate Professor Jennifer L. Erdely, Ph.D., was one of those people managing a health condition that caused chronic pain. She used her experience to create an autoethnographic performance called “I Got Your Back” to explore the ways people communicate about pain.
“There are so many issues that individuals with chronic pain manage, in addition to trying to keep a job, keep a relationship together, be a parent, and sometimes, serve as a caregiver to someone else,” Erdely said. “Frankly, I didn’t discuss my chronic pain before my director/co-author and I compiled my narratives into a performance.”
Working with Jade C. Huell, Ph.D., assistant professor at California State University, Northridge, Erdely used “I Got Your Back” to create a space where performers and an audience could explore pain and empathy through humor and storytelling.
“I’ve learned that most people don’t communicate about their chronic pain. People who suffer from chronic pain often suffer in silence. At times, they’ve been reprimanded at work for taking time off. Others’ relationships end in part because their lives change dramatically because of pain,” Erdely said.
The performance has become the basis for an ongoing study titled, “Chronic Pain: Patients’ Perspectives.” The duo planned to perform “I Got Your Back” at several conferences and venues earlier this year to survey audience members, conduct interviews, and document findings on how chronic pain is communicated. The novel coronavirus put a halt to those plans, so Erdely shifted the research to video interviews.
Photo credit: Jay Allison.
This spring, Erdely was awarded a faculty support grant from the new PVAMU Mellon Center for Faculty Excellence. The grant enables faculty members to focus on research projects for ten weeks. Erdely is conducting Zoom interviews with people living with chronic pain and submitting manuscripts to national communication journals.
“One of the goals of the Mellon award is to support creative endeavors. Dr. Erdely has done a phenomenal job maturating the ‘I Got Your Back’ project,” said William T. Hoston, Ph.D., professor, interim associate dean of the Marvin D. and June Samuel Brailsford College of Arts and Sciences at PVAMU, and director of the Mellon Center for Faculty Excellence.
Jennifer L. Erdely, Ph.D.
“Dr. Erdely’s unique approach to this underrepresented space is an example of the avant-garde research that is fully supported at PVAMU,” said Magesh Rajan, Ph.D., vice president for Research & Innovation. “The methodology will allow her to reach sectors of the public that would have historically been left out of the data.”
Erdely’s performances may be on hold, but she is still seeking participants to interview for her study.
“Not only do I want to learn more about chronic pain, but I also want to provide a space for people to talk about their pain with a fellow chronic pain sufferer,” Erdely said.
Dr. Erdely is accepting and scheduling interview participants via email at jlerdely@pvamu.edu.
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By Jocelyn Kerr