Perspectives on Mental Illness

Catalog description

This course explores the historic origins of mental health conceptualization in the US and throughout western Europe. Special consideration will be given to historic figures that lectured or worked in the United Kingdom and the influence they had on diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. We will explore various historic notions of what it means to be mentally ill from medical and first-person accounts. We will discuss various socio-political forces in the 18th through 20th centuries as impacting the ways in which the mentally ill were treated. There is a mandatory travel component for this course involving a trip to the United Kingdom where students will have an opportunity to explore the historic origins of mental health treatment and diagnosis in hospitals, poorhouses, clinics, and other settings.