Mind, modernity, madness [electronic resource] : the impact of culture on human experience / Liah Greenfeld.

9780674074408 electronic book
9780674072763

Cambridge : Harvard University Press, c2013.

English

1 online resource (x, 670 p.)

RC455 .G726 2013eb

616.89

In the culminating volume of her nationalism trilogy, Greenfeld argues that we have overlooked the connection between egalitarian society and mental illness. Modern nationalism rests on principles of popular sovereignty, equality, and secularism. Citizens of the twenty-first century enjoy unprecedented freedom to become the authors of their personal destinies. Empowering as this is, it also places them under enormous psychic strain. They must constantly appraise their identities, manage their desires, and calibrate their place within society. For vulnerable individuals, this pressure is too much. Training her analytic eye on extensive case histories in manic depression and schizophrenia, Greenfeld contends that these illnesses are dysfunctions of selfhood caused by society's overburdening demands for self-realization. In her rigorous diagnosis, madness is a culturally constituted malady.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

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