Mental Illness

Pieces compiled by several anthropologists including one of my favorite to read João Biehl, who's essay covers the decrepit state of universal health care in Brazil and the social abandonment Catarina endures after being committed to Vita. Catarina loses her identity and ultimately her humanity in a psychotropic haze as the primary type of medical treatment is pharmaceutical only.

Several other excellent essays are also included such as the tale of Uptown, Chicago, which hosts the largest concentration of severally mentally ill individuals in America.

Due to the deinstitutionalization of the 1960s prisons have become de facto asylums. This only exacerbates mental illness often leads to avoidable tragedy.