Overview

In Mind Fixers, Anne Harrington, author of The Cure Within, explores psychiatry's repeatedly frustrated struggle to understand mental disorder in biomedical terms. She shows how the stalling of early twentieth century efforts in this direction allowed Freudians and social scientists to insist, with some justification, that they had better ways of analyzing and fixing minds. But when the Freudians overreached, they drove psychiatry into a state of crisis that a new “biological revolution” was meant to alleviate. Harrington shows how little that biological revolution had to do with breakthroughs in science, and why the field has fallen into a state of crisis in our own time. Mind Fixers makes clear that psychiatry's waxing and waning biological enthusiasms have been shaped not just by developments in the clinic and lab, but also by a surprising range of social factors, including immigration, warfare, grassroots activism, and assumptions about race and gender. Government programs designed to empty the state mental hospitals, acrid rivalries between different factions in the field, industry profit mongering, consumerism, and an uncritical media have all contributed to the story as well. In focusing particularly on the search for the biological roots of schizophrenia, depression, and bipolar disorder, Harrington underscores the high human stakes for the millions of people who have sought medical answers for their mental suffering. This is not just a story about doctors and scientists, but about countless ordinary people and their loved ones. A clear-eyed, evenhanded, and yet passionate tour de force, Mind Fixers recounts the past and present struggle to make mental illness a biological problem in order to lay the groundwork for creating a better future, both for those who suffer and for those whose job it is to care for them.

Full Product Details

9780393358063

Table of Contents

Reviews

Anne Harrington has written a lucid and compelling analysis of the travails of psychiatry as it has attempted to ground its understanding of mental illness in biology. She confronts the gaps between its aspirations and reality with fairness and even sympathy.--Steven E. Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research A fascinating and wide-ranging unpacking of the field. Anyone interested in mental health care's history and future will appreciate this informative and rewarding survey. A must-read that will interest general readers and medical professionals alike. A measured, insightful survey of the limits of contemporary treatment for mental illness. A tale of promising roads that turned out to be dead ends, of treatments that seemed miraculous in their day but barbaric in retrospect, of public-health policies that were born in hope but destined for disaster...Of value to historians of medicine.--Gary Greenberg A laudable venture, in which Harrington's intellectual precision and exacting research cannot be faulted.--Helen Thompson Masterful.--Philip Alcabes Harrington's grasp of this story and the clarity with which, with limited moralism, she delivers a tale about the 'big picture' of psychiatry and neurology is emblematic of the historian's craft.--Stephen T. Casper

Masterful... Harrington's grasp of this story and the clarity with which, with limited moralism, she delivers a tale about the 'big picture' of psychiatry and neurology is emblematic of the historian's craft. -- Stephen T. Casper - Science A laudable venture, in which Harrington's intellectual precision and exacting research cannot be faulted. -- Helen Thompson - The New York Times Book Review The story Harrington tells is one of push-and-pull, back-and-forth... Intricate and winding, though her prose remains clear and crisp. -- Jennifer Szalai - The New York Times Superb... nuanced... In Mind Fixers, Anne Harrington has written an excellent, engaging guide to what biological psychiatry has accomplished-and not accomplished-so far. -- Richard J. McNally - The Wall Street Journal ...often shocking but admirably fair and level-headed history... -- Simon Ings - New Scientist Rosenhan's study exemplifies much of what went wrong in twentieth-century psychiatry, as biologists, psychoanalysts and sociologists struggled for supremacy. Science historian Anne Harrington takes us through the painful history of that struggle in the enthralling Mind Fixers, which focuses particularly on the United States. -- Nature By charting our fluctuating beliefs about our own minds, Harrington effectively tells a story about the twentieth century itself. -- The New Yorker A tale of promising roads that turned out to be dead ends, of treatments that seemed miraculous in their day but barbaric in retrospect, of public-health policies that were born in hope but destined for disaster... Of value to historians of medicine. -- The Atlantic

Anne Harrington has written a lucid and compelling analysis of the travails of psychiatry as it has attempted to ground its understanding of mental illness in biology. She confronts the gaps between its aspirations and reality with fairness and even sympathy.--Steven E. Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research A must-read that will interest general readers and medical professionals alike. A fascinating and wide-ranging unpacking of the field. A measured, insightful survey of the limits of contemporary treatment for mental illness. Anyone interested in mental health care's history and future will appreciate this informative and rewarding survey. A tale of promising roads that turned out to be dead ends, of treatments that seemed miraculous in their day but barbaric in retrospect, of public-health policies that were born in hope but destined for disaster...Of value to historians of medicine.--Gary Greenberg A laudable venture, in which Harrington's intellectual precision and exacting research cannot be faulted.--Helen Thompson Harrington's grasp of this story and the clarity with which, with limited moralism, she delivers a tale about the 'big picture' of psychiatry and neurology is emblematic of the historian's craft.--Stephen T. Casper Masterful.--Philip Alcabes

Author Information

Anne Harrington is the Franklin L. Ford Professor of the History of Science and faculty dean of Pforzheimer House at Harvard University. She is the author of four books, including Mind Fixers and The Cure Within. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available