Anthropological perspectives on the trajectory from institutionalisation to community care in Irish psychiatry.

Abstract

The trajectory of the anthropology of Irish psychiatry, like the trajectory of Irish psychiatry itself, is indelibly shaped by the history of Ireland's mental hospitals. This paper focuses on three works concerning the anthropology of psychiatry in Ireland: Nancy Scheper-Hughes's book, Saints Scholars and Schizophrenics: Mental Illness in Rural Ireland, an anthropological study (1977/2001); Eileen Kane's paper, 'Stereotypes and Irish identity: mental illness as a cultural frame', from Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review (1986) and Michael D'Arcy's conference paper, 'The hospital and the Holy Spirit: psychotic subjectivity and institutional returns in Dublin, Ireland' (2015), based on his PhD dissertation. All three publications explore the relationship between institutional and community psychiatric care in Ireland, concluding with the work of D'Arcy which, like much good anthropology, is rooted in the lived experience of mental illness and combines deep awareness of the past with tolerance of multiple, ostensibly contradictory narratives in the present.