Psychological Anthropology

This course addresses the wide variety of social relations and cultural contexts in which mental health and mental illness are experienced in the twenty-first century. Our inquiry is structured around etiological/diagnostic concepts that have achieved a global presence in popular culture and clinical care: trauma, addiction, stress, depression, neurodiversity. We will learn where and how these concepts arose; how they have changed over time and place; how they operate in clinical vis-à-vis "lay" contexts of assessment and care; and how they shape our self-understanding, our social interactions, and our relation to expertise and institutions.