Some things I learned from M&M: Firstly, psychiatry as a form of Enlightenment social control was for me (as a neuroscience major) a shocking dissent from progressive biological historiographies. Furthermore, mass confinement of psychiatric patients was sustained into the early twentieth century by the speculative and dangerous therapies of powerful medical men vying for psychiatric dominance. (Closely related to Foucault's power and knowledge thesis - 'Madness and Civilisation'). This subject then traces how the patriarchal exploitation of soldiers, women and deviants during WWI and WWII was later rejected by counterculture anti-psychiatrists and feminists who argued society itself was insane. I wrote my major essay on the transition from 'Shell Shock to PTSD,' and how the notion of 'mental trauma' was not made real until it was documented in the 1980 DSMIII psychiatric manual due to work with Vietnam Veterans. Finally, the transient symptoms within PTSD and Multiple Personality Disorder has in the twenty first century actually undermined the ontology of mental illness. This indicates that whilst mental illness is of course real, some elements of it are a social construction, that can be influenced by the media we consume and geography or local society we live in. I highly recommend M&M as a breadth subject for those planning on sitting the GAMSAT and wanting a framework for essays regarding the impact of science on humanity, and social constructions.

Anonymous, Semester 2, 2018

Not entirely sure what I've learnt from this subject. Found myself floating around and getting lost in the somewhat confusing content. 2.5

Anonymous, Semester 2, 2016