Book ID: CBB084565336

Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History (2016)

unapi

Lambe, Jennifer Lynn (Author)


University of North Carolina Press


Publication Date: 2016
Physical Details: 345 pages
Language: English

On the outskirts of Havana lies Mazorra, an asylum known to--and at times feared by--ordinary Cubans for over a century. Since its founding in 1857, the island's first psychiatric hospital has been an object of persistent political attention. Drawing on hospital documents and government records, as well as the popular press, photographs, and oral histories, Jennifer L. Lambe charts the connections between the inner workings of this notorious institution and the highest echelons of Cuban politics. Across the sweep of modern Cuban history, she finds, Mazorra has served as both laboratory and microcosm of the Cuban state: the asylum is an icon of its ignominious colonial and neocolonial past and a crucible of its republican and revolutionary futures.From its birth, Cuban psychiatry was politically inflected, drawing partisan contention while sparking debates over race, religion, gender, and sexuality. Psychiatric notions were even invested with revolutionary significance after 1959, as the new government undertook ambitious schemes for social reeducation. But Mazorra was not the exclusive province of government officials and professionalizing psychiatrists. U.S. occupiers, Soviet visitors, and, above all, ordinary Cubans infused the institution, both literal and metaphorical, with their own fears, dreams, and alternative meanings. Together, their voices comprise the madhouse that, as Lambe argues, haunts the revolutionary trajectory of Cuban history.

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Reviewed By

Review José Amador (2018) Review of "Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History". American Historical Review (pp. 275-276). unapi

Review Stephanie H Gonzalez (2018) Review of "Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History". History of Psychiatry (pp. 496-497). unapi

Review Manuella Meyer (2019) Review of "Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History". Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences (pp. 167-168). unapi

Review Jonathan D. Ablard (2018) Review of "Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History". Bulletin of the History of Medicine (pp. 217-219). unapi

Review Edward Shorter (2017) Review of "Madhouse: Psychiatry and Politics in Cuban History". Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences (pp. 925-926). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB084565336/

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Authors & Contributors
Silvano, Giovanni
Faschi, Viviana
Valacchi, Maria Luisa
Gaspari, Fiora
Crawley, Alex
Borri, Matteo
Concepts
Psychiatric hospitals
Psychiatry
Hospitals and clinics
Mental disorders and diseases
Medicine
Medicine and politics
Time Periods
19th century
20th century
18th century
20th century, early
17th century
Places
France
Australia
Italy
Bahia (Brazil)
United States
Europe
Institutions
Catholic University of Ireland (Dublin)
Royal Belfast Academical Institution
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