Madness to Prozac

Spring 2010

Madness to Prozac: The Sciences of the Self in the Modern Era

Listed in: History, as HIST-96

Faculty

Michal Shapira (Section 01)

Description

[EU] This seminar will explore the emergence of sciences of the self in the West from the late eighteenth century to the twenty-first century. We will concentrate especially on psychiatry and psychology and how they have shaped and remade modern selves. Using interdisciplinary scholarship from history, critical theory, sociology, and psychology, we will examine the following topics: the birth of modern psychiatry and psychology; theories of madness; the rise of the asylum; colonial psychiatry; sexology; the medicalization of gender and ethnic difference; the emergence of neurosis and trauma; psychoanalysis and talking cure; hysteria; shell shock and post-traumatic stress disorder; human sciences and the welfare state, and the rise of the “Prozac Nation.” One class meeting per week.

Limited to 15 students. Not open to first-year students. Spring semester. Visiting Professor Shapira.

If Overenrolled: Priority given to pre-registered Amherst College students, next to pre-registered Five College students, and then to students who come to the first class.

Offerings