Monica Butler - 4-30 - Crazy Like Us

Monica Butler - 4-30 - Crazy Like Us 

The two chapters of Crazy Like Us both explored the psychological implications of eating disorders and depression in the context of local realities, culture, and globalization. Many of the observations written about summed up the influence of globalization on the world of psychiatry. Watters quotes Kirmayer’s concluding points that he made at the GlaxoSmithKline conference: “in constant transaction and transformation across boundaries of race, culture, class, and nation. In this context, it is important to recognize that psychiatry itself is part of an international subculture that imposes certain categories on the world that may not fit equally well everywhere and that never completely captures the illness experience and concerns of patients” (197). The cultural understanding of depression and anorexia can be transformed by the media messages and global messages that are implicated by cross-cultural relations. The capitalist driven pharmaceutical company can exploit this once they understand the cultural importance surrounding psychological diseases. Likewise, the takeover of Westernization through the media has dominated the research behind the cause of Anorexia. The local cultural implication of these diseases in the Eastern world have been blinded and, as a result, make it difficult for us to properly diagnose these diseases. 

To address the first chapter, The Rise of Anorexia is Hong Kong, Watters attempts to address the cultural atmosphere of Hong Kong and the political changes that have occurred and caused stress since the overturn of British rule. The women that Dr. Lee treats have symptoms of Anorexia that are much different than those of American girls. They do not see themselves as fat, they have less body dysmorphia, they are not often perfectionists, and they do no often come from more well-to-do circumstances. Lee found that more often than not, anorexia was a result of a recent emotional trauma. 

It is important to look at the local cultural implications that parallel the rise in the disease among young women in Hong Kong. With increasing globalization comes the penetration of western culture. During the 1990s emigration from China was common and the interdependence and support system of an extended family began to break down, causing a shift toward individualism. Which we characterize as a prevalent characteristic of the US and the West. These “local realities,” as Watters describes, and rapid social change have negative implications on the sanity of young girls in China. Could this be a cause for anorexia? The stress of growing up in a world of instability and the uncertainty of a future in the one of the World’s/the World’s most competitive countries? When describing the origin of anorexia Lee points out, "There may therefore be no true natural history of [anorexia nervosa], but rather a social history at a given time and place, a perspective which questions radically the biomedical assumption that there is a 'core problem' with [anorexia nervosa]." Lee attributes anorexia to a social problem entirely and continues to conclude that the Western suggestion that it is a “fear of fatness” is not possible in the cultural context of China. Fatness has never been something that has been viewed negatively in the culture. With the publicity surrounding the subject in 1994 came the sand storm of the media trying to decipher the disease. Calling upon Western research and Western reasoning without introducing cultural realities. In doing so they have brushed over the core-problems of the disease and make it more difficult to divulge into the psychological causes. It is important to explore the social contention behind the disease instead of allowing the Western ideals of the disease infiltrate the local research. 

Similarly the other chapter focused on another psychological disease, depression. Depression has been recognized as a disease in America since the post WWII era. However, in Japan, it has traditionally been more stigmatized. In Japanese culture there is more focus on understanding emotion on a less extroverted scale. Watters introduces a quote by Lock that helps better understand the emotional state of the Japanese experience. “Unlike anger and irritability, which both disrupt harmony and threaten the social order, sadness, grief, and melancholy are accepted as an inevitable part of human life and even welcomed at times for their symbolic value, as a reminder of the ephemeral nature of this world. An association between melancholy and the weather reinforces sad feelings as natural and unavoidable and hence as states not induced solely through human exchange” (212). I think this quote is important to understand how the Japanese emotional state is more directly related to the spirit, nature, and the human experience. It is less associated with the western explanations that lie in the precision of science. Because this is true, it was smart for GlaxoSmithKline to spend their money on researching the cultural experience of the Japanese culture. However, their intentions were not set out to cure the disease. Watters even concludes that the drugs may have caused more suicides, and it is questionable if they even work. If both GlaxoSmithKline and we understand that the experience of depression for each culture is different, wouldn’t that mean that the drugs would not be universal because the symptoms are not universal? Research into drugs that actually work must take into account the cultural problems and the neurological problems. “By applying a one-size-fits-all notion of depression around the world, Kirmayer argued, we run the risk of obscuring the social meaning and response the experience might be indicating” (196). As the first quote indicated (“in constant transaction and transformation across boundaries of race, culture, class, and nation. In this context, it is important to recognize that psychiatry itself is part of an international subculture that imposes certain categories on the world that may not fit equally well everywhere and that never completely captures the illness experience and concerns of patients” (197).)We cannot look at these diseases through a globalized eye. The effect of cultures is too important to ignore when analyzing mental diseases.