The Culture-Bound Syndromes: Folk Illnesses of Psychiatric and Anthropological Interest(7 Culture, Illness and Healing)

In the last few years there has been a great revival of interest in culture-bound psychiatric syndromes. A spate of new papers has been published on well known and less familiar syndromes, and there have been a number of attempts to put some order into the field of inquiry. In a review of the literature on culture-bound syndromes up to 1969 Yap made certain suggestions for organizing thinking about them which for the most part have not received general acceptance (see Carr, this volume, p. 199). Through the seventies new descriptive and conceptual work was scarce, but in the last few years books and papers discussing the field were authored or edited by Tseng and McDermott (1981), AI-Issa (1982), Friedman and Faguet (1982) and Murphy (1982). In 1983 Favazza summarized his understanding of the state of current thinking for the fourth edition of the Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry, and a symposium on culture-bound syndromes was organized by Kenny for the Eighth International Congress of Anthropology and Ethnology. The strong­ est impression to emerge from all this recent work is that there is no substantive consensus, and that the very concept, "culture-bound syndrome" could well use some serious reconsideration. As the role of culture-specific beliefs and prac­ tices in all affliction has come to be increasingly recognized it has become less and less clear what sets the culture-bound syndromes apart.

Table of Contents:
Culture-Bound or Construct-Bound? The Syndromes and DSM-III.- Sorting the Culture-Bound Syndromes.- I: Folk Illnesses of Psychiatric Interest in which some Evidence Supports the Hypothesis of a Neurophysiological Shaping Factor.- A. The Startle Matching Taxon.- The Resolution of the Latah Paradox.- Paradox Lost: The Latah Problem Revisited.- Latah II — Problems with a Purely Symbolic Interpretation: A Reply to Michael G. Kenny.- Shamans and Imu: Among Two Ainu Groups — Toward a Cross-Cultural Model of Interpretation.- Commentary.- B. The Sleep Paralysis Taxon.- Uqamairineq and Uqumanigianiq: Eskimo Sleep Paralysis.- The Old Hag Phenomenon as Sleep Paralysis: A Biocultural Interpretation.- Commentary.- II: Folk Illnesses of Psychiatric Interest in which a Neurophysiological Shaping Factor is only Suspected.- A. The Genital Retraction Taxon.- Koro — A Cultural Disease.- Koro in a Nigerian Male Patient: A Case Report.- The Koro Pattern of Depersonalization in an American Schizophrenic Patient.- Indigenous Koro, A Genital Retraction Syndrome of Insular Southeast Asia: A Critical Review.- Commentary.- B. The Sudden Mass Assault Taxon.- Ethno-Behaviorism and the Culture-Bound Syndromes: The Case of Amok.- Sudden Mass Assault with Grenade: An Epidemic Amok Form from Laos.- The Amok Syndrome in Papua and New Guinea.- Amok.- Commentary.- C. The Running Taxon.- Pibloktoq (Hysteria) Among the Polar Eskimo: An Ethnopsychiatric Study.- Grisi Siknis in Miskito Culture.- The Transformation of Arctic Hysteria.- Commentary.- III: Folk Illnesses Usually Listed as Culture-Bound Psychiatric Syndromes which should Probably No Longer be so Considered.- A. The Fright Illness Taxon.- The Folk Illness Called Susto.- Saladera — A Culture-Bound Misfortune Syndrome in the Peruvian Amazon.-Lanti, Illness by Fright Among Bisayan Filipinos.- Mogo Laya, A New Guinea Fright Illness.- Commentary.- B. The Cannibal Compulsion Taxon.- Windigo Psychosis: The Anatomy of an Emic-Etic Confusion.- Commentaries and Replies.- Commentary.- Append.- Glossary of ‘Culture-Bound’ or Folk Psychiatric Syndromes.- Charles C. Hughes.- List of Contributors.- to the Index.