Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

--- 2023-471g4--week_5_day_1 [2023/09/26 00:54] – 76.78.225.223
+++ 2023-471g4--week_5_day_1 [2023/09/26 12:50] (current) – 68.98.147.134
@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
+. I found it particularly interesting how Dr. McClurken chose his selected region of focus. The selection of Pittsylvania county and Danville specifically as the town of focus helps to isolate the issue of mental health and “human consequences”. I thought this angle was a very informative one because a lot of Civil War history tends to glance over these “human consequences” and focus moreso on battles, casualties, and general destruction. -Joey Welch
+. “The massive economic, physical, and psychological impact of the Civil War on Confederate veteran families caused the most needy to slip through the cracks of the older, local system.” I saw a correlation in this passage similar to the deinstitutionalization period of the early-mid 20th century. - Joey Welch
 . Gonaver mentions a census in 1840 that pointed to a disproportionately high rate of insanity among African Americans in Maine; what sort of observations were made regarding mental health in the census and how was this information procured? - Morgan
@@ Line 23: / Line 27: @@
 . I think it is incredibly ironic how Dr. Minson Galt II died. As mentioned in the introduction of Gonaver’s work, Dr. Galt died of an overdose and that he had a history of opiate dependence. He was sick for four days before he came down with an illness “reflecting on the brain.” It’s ironic because Galt ended up struggling with the same ailments that he was in charge of treating in his facility. It is understandable, considering how much stress superintendents were under, especially during and after the Civil War. However, it’s still pretty ironic. I wonder how many superintendents ended up facing similar struggles to their patients? -Teresa
+. The idea that some of the normal social mores of life in the South broke down in asylums is quite interesting. The practical fact that enslaved people were taking care of institutionalized whites who were at times unable to care for themselves brings up a really unique dichotomy, one where in one way enslaved people had an elevated status in a position of power to whites, but in another they were still performing difficult, unpaid, domestic labor. I wonder then, in what ways did the institution of the asylum reinforce and break traditional constructions of race and status? -RM
+. “Shell shock,” or what we’d now call PTSD, wasn’t invented in the Great War, nor was it in the American Civil War–it has been around for quite a bit longer, and is involved with far more than just war. That being said, my impression is that the aftermath of the Civil War was the first time that “shell shock” was put through the treatment apparatus of an asylum, at least on a large scale. The case of the Confederate asylum patients is fascinating, not just on account of the level of state support made available to the veterans, but also in the idea that more likely than not, this is a sliver of psychological effects of the Civil War in the south, not to mention the US writ large. I’m left comparing the treatment at Western State to what we’ve seen thus far in PA with Kirkbride, and it appears to me (an untrained eye, admittedly) that there’s a lot less of an emphasis on things like moral treatment in the south, and I’m left wondering why that might be. -RM