The Tuesday Ritual

Group Strategies as Support Points for Building Community

Abstract

This article addresses a community mental health experience with older adults in the “Bajada Grande” neighborhood (Paraná, Entre Ríos). It presents the territory as a living network of relationships and tensions, from which a group dynamic has emerged and been sustained for decades. The group functions as a ritual, offering a symbolic space for pause, encounter, and collective meaning making, especially valuable for a population undergoing significant life transformations.
The article proposes a de-normalization of old age, questioning ageist stereotypes and terms that infantilize or pathologize older adults. From the perspective of Latin American Community Mental Health and Collective Health, aging is understood as a heterogeneous, multi-determined, and situated process, where prevention, promotion, and social participation become central. The program seeks to promote non-welfare-based practices, strengthen community networks, and foster autonomy, desire, and democratic participation among older adults.
The group becomes a space for collective care that combats loneliness, accompanies bereavement, enables play and laughter as therapeutic tools, and creates micro-networks of support. All of this is aimed at transforming social representations and institutional practices, promoting healthy old age and citizenship.