Bhargavi V. Davar and T. K. Sundari Ravindran (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780199453535
- eISBN:
- 9780199085408
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199453535.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Health, Illness, and Medicine
Steeped in archaic and narrow colonial attitudes towards people of ‘unsound mind’, the discourse on mental health in India, as also the public apparatus dealing with it, are rigid, exclusionary and ...
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Steeped in archaic and narrow colonial attitudes towards people of ‘unsound mind’, the discourse on mental health in India, as also the public apparatus dealing with it, are rigid, exclusionary and deeply gender insensitive. Interrogating the ways in which we understand and deal with mental health disabilities, this volume unravels the voices of women trapped in the predominantly skewed discourse of mental ill-health as ‘madness’, within the sciences, legal systems, policies, and the media. The chapters focus on the state of mental health of Indian women, with respect to social attitudes, cultural barriers, treatment, policies, safeguards, or lack thereof. The chapters ask fundamental questions: Is ‘mental illness’ a social, medical, legal, penal, historical, personal construct? Is mental disorder a disability? Do people living with a mental ailment have a ‘memory’, or the ‘insight’ to tell their own stories? In dealing with these questions, it seeks to provide a perspective on how women suffering from mental illness, view themselves and their surroundings in India.Less
Steeped in archaic and narrow colonial attitudes towards people of ‘unsound mind’, the discourse on mental health in India, as also the public apparatus dealing with it, are rigid, exclusionary and deeply gender insensitive. Interrogating the ways in which we understand and deal with mental health disabilities, this volume unravels the voices of women trapped in the predominantly skewed discourse of mental ill-health as ‘madness’, within the sciences, legal systems, policies, and the media. The chapters focus on the state of mental health of Indian women, with respect to social attitudes, cultural barriers, treatment, policies, safeguards, or lack thereof. The chapters ask fundamental questions: Is ‘mental illness’ a social, medical, legal, penal, historical, personal construct? Is mental disorder a disability? Do people living with a mental ailment have a ‘memory’, or the ‘insight’ to tell their own stories? In dealing with these questions, it seeks to provide a perspective on how women suffering from mental illness, view themselves and their surroundings in India.
