Author: R. D. LaingPublisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 282
Book Description
Author: 
Author: Aaron EstersonThe Divided Self
Author: R. D. LaingPublisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0141962089
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
The Divided Self, R.D. Laing's groundbreaking exploration of the nature of madness, illuminated the nature of mental illness and made the mysteries of the mind comprehensible to a wide audience. First published in 1960, this watershed work aimed to make madness comprehensible, and in doing so revolutionized the way we perceive mental illness. Using case studies of patients he had worked with, psychiatrist R. D. Laing argued that psychosis is not a medical condition, but an outcome of the 'divided self', or the tension between the two personas within us: one our authentic, private identity, and the other the false, 'sane' self that we present to the world. Laing's radical approach to insanity offered a rich existential analysis of personal alienation and made him a cult figure in the 1960s, yet his work was most significant for its humane attitude, which put the patient back at the centre of treatment. Includes an introduction by Professor Anthony S. David. 'One of the twentieth century's most influential psychotherapists' Guardian 'Laing challenged the psychiatric orthodoxy of his time ... an icon of the 1960s counter-culture' The Times
The Crucible of Experience
Author: Daniel BurstonPublisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674002173
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 188
Book Description
One of the great rebels of psychiatry, R. D. Laing challenged prevailing models of madness and the nature and limits of psychiatric authority. In this brief and lucid book, Laing’s widely praised biographer distills the essence of Laing’s vision, which was religious and philosophical as well as psychological. The Crucible of Experience reveals Laing’s philosophical debts to existentialism and phenomenology in his theories of madness and sanity, family theory and family therapy. Daniel Burston offers the first detailed account of Laing’s practice as a therapist and of his relationships—often contentious—with his friends and sometime disciples. Burston carefully differentiates between Laing and “Laingians,” who were often clearer, more confident, and more simplistic than their teacher. While he examines Laing’s theories of madness, Burston focuses most provocatively on Laing’s views of sanity and normality and on his recognition, toward the end of his life, of the essential place of holiness in human experience. In a powerful last chapter, Burston shows that Laing foresaw the present commercialization of medicine and asked pointed questions about what the meaning of sanity and the future of psychotherapy in such a world could be. In this, as in other matters, Laing’s questions of a generation ago remain questions for our time.
Back to Sanity
Author: Steve TaylorPublisher: Hay House, Inc
ISBN: 1848508751
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
Languages : en
Pages : 297
Book Description
Have you ever thought that there might be something wrong with human beings, even that we might be slightly insane? Why is it that so many human beings are filled with a restless discontent, and an insatiable desire for material goods, status and power? Why is it that human history has been filled with endless conflict, oppression and inequality? In this ground-breaking and inspiring book, Steve Taylor shows that we do suffer from a psychological disorder, which he refers to as humania, or ego-madness. This disorder is so close to us that we don't realize it's there, but it's the root cause of all our dysfunctional behaviour, both as individuals and as a species. Back to Sanity explains the characteristics of humania, where it stems from and how it leads to the madness of materialism, status-seeking, warfare, inequality and other symptoms of our insanity. But equally importantly, Back to Sanity shows how we can heal this mental disorder and allow the fleeting moments of harmony that we all experience from time to time to become our permanent state of being.
A Madness So Discreet
Author: Mindy McGinnisPublisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062320882
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 221
Book Description
Edgar Award for Best Young Adult Mystery Mindy McGinnis, the acclaimed author of Not a Drop to Drink and In a Handful of Dust, combines murder, madness, and mystery in a beautifully twisted gothic historical thriller perfect for fans of novels such as Asylum and The Diviners as well as television's True Detective and American Horror Story. Grace Mae is already familiar with madness when family secrets and the bulge in her belly send her to an insane asylum—but it is in the darkness that she finds a new lease on life. When a visiting doctor interested in criminal psychology recognizes Grace's brilliant mind beneath her rage, he recruits her as his assistant. Continuing to operate under the cloak of madness at crime scenes allows her to gather clues from bystanders who believe her less than human. Now comfortable in an ethical asylum, Grace finds friends—and hope. But gruesome nights bring Grace and the doctor into the circle of a killer who will bring her shaky sanity and the demons in her past dangerously close to the surface.
Stalking Irish Madness
Author: Patrick TraceyPublisher: Bantam
ISBN: 0553905597
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 290
Book Description
In this powerful, sometimes harrowing, deeply felt story, Patrick Tracey journeys to Ireland to track the origin and solve the mystery of his Irish-American family's multigenerational struggle with schizophrenia. For most Irish Americans, a trip to Ireland is often an occasion to revisit their family's roots. But for Patrick Tracey, the lure of his ancestral home is a much more powerful need: part pilgrimage, part investigation to confront the genealogical mystery of schizophrenia–a disease that had claimed a great-great-great-grandmother, a grandmother, an uncle, and, most recently, two sisters. As long as Tracey could remember, schizophrenia ran on his mother's side, seldom spoken of outright but impossible to ignore. Devastated by the emotional toll the disease had already taken on his family, terrified of passing it on to any children he might have, and inspired by the recent discovery of the first genetic link to schizophrenia, Tracey followed his genealogical trail from Boston to Ireland's county Roscommon, home of his oldest-known schizophrenic ancestor. In a renovated camper, Tracey crossed the Emerald Isle to investigate the country that, until the 1960s, had the world's highest rate of institutionalization for mental illness, following clues and separating fact from fiction in the legendary relationship the Irish have had with madness. Tracey's path leads from fairy mounds and ancient caverns still shrouded in superstition to old pubs whose colorful inhabitants are a treasure trove of local lore. He visits the massive and grim asylum where his famine starved ancestors may have lived. And he interviews the Irish research team that first cracked the schizophrenic code to learn how much–and how little–we know about this often misunderstood disease. Filled with history, science, and lore, Stalking Irish Madness is an unforgettable chronicle of one man's attempt to make sense of his family's past and to find hope for the future of schizophrenic patients. From the Hardcover edition.
Between Sanity and Madness
Author: Allan V. HorwitzPublisher:
ISBN: 019090786X
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 385
Book Description
Since the earliest medical, philosophical, and literary texts in ancient civilizations, madness has posed some basic issues: how to separate sanity from insanity, to distinguish mental and bodily illnesses, and to specify the variety of internal and external forces that lead people to become mentally ill. This book explores the answers to these questions that have emerged over time and concludes that current portrayals are not much improved compared to those that emerged thousands of years ago. The puzzles that madness presents are likely to remain unresolved for the foreseeable future and perhaps forever.
Wisdom, Madness and Folly
Author: Ronald David LaingPublisher: Canongate Books
ISBN: 0862418313
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 177
Book Description
This remarkable autobiography charts the subtle horrors of Laing's own upbringing in the 1940s. The author's lucid and witty prose offers some unforgettable personal experiences and a host of cultural, political and professional insights.
