Pathologisation, Depathologisation and Mental Health: Keys for a Contemporary Discussion from Ibero-America

This book examines the pathologisation and depathologisation of mental health in Ibero-América. It highlights the possibilities and the epistemic limits of the interpretative models of pathos that have legitimised mental health pathologies. Further, it proposes a rereading of psychopathology and analyses the clinical, philosophical, ontological, ethical, psychological and anthropological consequences of this.

Across ten chapters it brings together academics from Latin America with colleagues from Europe, Asia and North America to address issues including stigma, aesthetics, childhood, gender, migration, political public or social networks and their relationship with mental health. Section 1 brings critical psychology into dialogue with psychiatry, sociology, philosophy and psychoanalysis to review the conceptual frameworks through which pathology has been understood in psy discourses. Section 2 presents a range of case studies that demonstrate the impact of debates around the pathologisation and de-pathologisation on mental health care in various populations across Latin American.

It will offer fresh insights to practitioners, as well as to students and scholars working in the areas of mental health, critical psychology, medical sociology, Latin American studies, psychiatry and psychoanalysis.