Shrinking Expectations

Shrinking Expectations

The History and Epistemology of Psychiatry
1600-1950

Until the end of the 19th century, Psychiatry limited its scope to those diseases we now call psychoses. Around the beginning of the 20th its scope was expanded to the treatment of psychosomatic illnesses, or that nebulous term hysteria. It was only later in the 20th century that the broadly generic term, now largely abandoned neurosis enlarged the domain of the psychiatrist to include all forms of human behavior.

Examining the history of psychiatric practice, one discovers that conceptions of therapy have always been largely dependent on prevailing views as to the moral, philosophical, social or religious character of the subject and of the disease itself.One finds, for example, that many 19th century regimes for curing madness were based on the undisputed presence of moral depravity in the soul of the insane.

Despite a general pessimism present in this historical overview, one must agree that the permanent dialogue over the relationship of the mind to the body that one finds in the psychiatric thought of the last 400 years, makes for a fascinating study.

Table of Contents

  1. Psychiatry defined

  2. History of the notion of an Unconscious Mind

  3. The modern theory of the Unconscious

  4. Hypnosis

  5. The debate of Suggestion versus Will

  6. Insanity in the Treatment of the Insane

  7. Punishment as Therapy

  8. Bibliography

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The price of "Shrinking Expectations" is $10.


Send check, cash or money order to:

Roy Lisker
8 Liberty Street#306
Middletown,CT 06457
rlisker@yahoo.com


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