Table of Contents

FOREWORD, ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, INTRODUCTION: Anthropological Perspectives on Global Mental Health, 1. Historical Background: Medical Anthropology and Global Mental Health, 2. Anthropological Methods in Global Mental Health Research, PART I: SOCIAL AND STRUCTURAL ORIGINS OFMENTAL ILLNESS IN GLOBAL CONTEXT, 3. Water, Worry, and Doña Paloma: Why Water Security is Fundamental to Global Mental Health, 4. Life in Transit: Mental Health, Temporality, and Urban Displacement for Iraqi Refugees, 5. Reconnecting Hope: Khat Consumption, Time, and Mental Well-Being among Unemployed Young Men in Jimma, Ethiopia, 6. The Greater Good: Surviving Sexual Violence for Schooling, 7. Grandmothers, Children, and Intergenerational Distress in Nicaraguan Transnational Families, 8. Addiction in Colombia: Local Lives, Broader Lessons, PART II: TREATMENT APPROACHES AND ACCESS TO CARE IN LOW- AND HIGH-RESOURCE SETTINGS, 9. Life “Under the Wire”: Perceived Discrimination and Mental Health of Haitian Migrants in the Dominican Republic, 10. Festive Fighting and Forgiving: Ritual and Resilience among Indigenous Indian “Conservation Refugees”, 11. Who Belongs in a Psychiatric Hospital? Post-Socialist Romania in the Age of Globalizing Psychiatry, 12. The “Cost” of Health Care: Poverty, Depression, and Diabetes among Mexican Immigrants in the United States, 13. The Few, the Proud: Women Combat Veterans and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in the United States, 14. Cultural Competence and Its Discontents: Reflections on a Mandatory Course for Psychiatry Residents, PART III: TASK-SHARING AND ALTERNATIVE CAREMODELS, 15. People, Praxis, and Power in Global Mental Health: Anthropology and the Experience Gap, 16. “Thinking Too Much” in the Central Plateau: An Apprenticeship Approach to Treating Local Distress in Haiti, 17. Task-Shifting in Global Health: Mental Health Implications for Community Health Workers and Volunteers, 18. “We Can’t Find This Spirit of Help”: Mental Health, Social Issues, and Community Home-Based Care Providers in Central Mozambique, 19. Shared Humanity among Nonspecialist Peer Care Providers for Persons Living with Psychosis: Implications for Global Mental Health, CONCLUSION: A Road Map for Anthropology and Global Mental Health, INDEX, CONTRIBUTORS

About the Author

Brandon Kohrt is a medical anthropologist and psychiatrist. He is Assistant Professor of Global Health and Psychiatry at Duke University, USA. He conducts global mental health research focusing on populations affected by war-related trauma and chronic stressors of poverty, discrimination, and lack of access to healthcare and education. He has worked in Nepal for 16 years using a biocultural developmental perspective integrating epidemiology, cultural anthropology, ethnopsychology, and neuroendocrinology. With Transcultural Psychosocial Organization (TPO) Nepal, he designed and evaluated psychosocial reintegration packages for child soldiers in Nepal. He currently works with The Carter Center Mental Health Liberia Program developing anti-stigma campaigns and family psychoeducation programs. He was a Laughlin Fellow of the American College of Psychiatrists and a John Spiegel Fellow of the Society for the Study of Psychiatry and Culture (SSPC). Kohrt has contributed to numerous documentary films including Returned: Child Soldiers of NepalAEs Maoist Army . Emily Mendenhall is an assistant professor of global health in the Science, Technology, and International Affairs (STIA) Program at Georgetown UniversityAEs Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. She has conducted cross-cultural research on the syndemics of poverty, depression, and diabetes among vulnerable populations in urban India, Kenya, South Africa, and United States. She published this research as a book titled Syndemic Suffering: Social Distress, Depression, and Diabetes among Mexican Immigrant Women , and she has published peer-reviewed articles in journals such as Social Science & Medicine, Culture, Medicine & Psychiatry, Medical Anthropology, Medical Anthropology Quarterly, PLoS One , and Global Health Action . Her most recent research examines the convergence of multiple social and health problems among those seeking medical care at a public hospital clinic buttressing the Kibera slum in Nairobi, Kenya. She also leads a non-profit organization that develops books on global health inequality.

Reviews

"Global Mental Health is not only for anthropologists but should be read by mental health professionals more generally and mental health policymakers in particular. The field of mental health is in need of a strong anthropological perspective. This would provide a balance of views and a more holistic approach to mental health in both knowledge and intervention." --Michael J. Kral, American Journal of Human Biology

"At BasicNeeds we run programmes for mentally ill people in 12 low income countries and the challenges we face daily are uncannily similar to those described in this powerful book. We identify people who need support, who struggle for treatment and who in the end contribute productively to their homes and community. None of this would be possible without a deep respect for the diverse cultures we work in and this book perfectly balances these imperatives of working with a community based approach and culture. Deeply sensitive, insightful and practical." --Chris Underhill MBE, founder/President, BasicNeed

"This book is truly global in its focus on both high- and low-income countries' mental health services, thus addressing issues that affect all health systems. The contributions range from psychiatric residents in Boston and peer providers in Chicago to nurses in Liberia and community health workers in Haiti. Through the narratives of patients and health-care providers, the chapters taken together demonstrate a range of barriers to accessing care." --From the foreword by Vikram Patel

"This outstanding collection of studies shows the vigor and promise of anthropological approaches for advancing global mental health. The editors have assembled a new generation of scholars who address the social structural origins of mental health problems and novel treatment approaches to improving access to culturally appropriate care. Special attention is given to the dominant strategy of task-shifting as well as to alternative models of care that incorporate indigenous concepts of distress and healing practices. The book is truly global in scope--touching on issues distinctive to urban and rural, wealthy and low income settings."
--Laurence J. Kirmayer, McGill University