Thomas S. Szasz

Thomas S. Szasz
Author: Jeffrey A. Schaler
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 295
Release: 2017-09-08
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1351295020

As it entered the 1960s, American institutional psychiatry was thriving, with a high percentage of medical students choosing the field. But after Thomas S. Szasz published his masterwork in 1961, The Myth of Mental Illness, the psychiatric world was thrown into chaos. Szasz enlightened the world about what he called the “myth of mental illness.” His point was not that no one is mentally ill, or that people labeled as mentally ill do not exist. Instead he believed that diagnosing people as mentally ill was inconsistent with the rules governing pathology and the classification of disease. He asserted that the diagnosis of mental illness is a type of social control, not medical science. The editors were uniquely close to Szasz, and here they gather, for the first time, a group of their peers—experts on psychiatry, psychology, rhetoric, and semiotics—to elucidate Szasz’s body of work. Thomas S. Szasz: The Man and His Ideas examines his work and legacy, including new material on the man himself and the seeds he planted. They discuss Szasz’s impact on their thinking about the distinction between physical and mental illness, addiction, the insanity plea, schizophrenia, and implications for individual freedom and responsibility. This important volume offers insight into and understanding of a man whose ideas were far beyond his time.

The Myth of Mental Illness

The Myth of Mental Illness
Author: Thomas S. Szasz
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 436
Release: 2011-07-12
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0062104748

“The landmark book that argued that psychiatry consistently expands its definition of mental illness to impose its authority over moral and cultural conflict.” — New York Times The 50th anniversary edition of the most influential critique of psychiatry every written, with a new preface on the age of Prozac and Ritalin and the rise of designer drugs, plus two bonus essays. Thomas Szasz's classic book revolutionized thinking about the nature of the psychiatric profession and the moral implications of its practices. By diagnosing unwanted behavior as mental illness, psychiatrists, Szasz argues, absolve individuals of responsibility for their actions and instead blame their alleged illness. He also critiques Freudian psychology as a pseudoscience and warns against the dangerous overreach of psychiatry into all aspects of modern life.

Thomas Szasz

Thomas Szasz
Author: C. V. Haldipur
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 350
Release: 2019-01-24
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0192543229

Thomas Szasz wrote over thirty books and several hundred articles, replete with mordant criticism of psychiatry, in both scientific and popular periodicals. His works made him arguably one of the world's most recognized psychiatrists, albeit one of the most controversial. These writings have been translated into several languages and have earned him a worldwide following. Szasz was a man of towering intellect, sweeping historical knowledge, and deep-rooted, mostly libertarian, philosophical beliefs. He wrote with a lucid and acerbic wit, but usually in a way that is accessible to general readers. His books cautioned against the indiscriminate power of psychiatry in courts and in society, and against the apparent rush to medicalize all human folly. They have spawned an eponymous ideology that has influenced, to various degrees, laws relating to mental health in several countries and states. This book critically examines the legacy of Thomas Szasz - a man who challenged the very concept of mental illness and questioned several practices of psychiatrists. The book surveys his many contributions including those in psychoanalysis, which are very often overlooked by his critics. While admiring his seminal contribution to the debate, the book will also point to some of his assertions that merit closer scrutiny. Contributors to the book are drawn from various disciplines, including Psychiatry, Philosophy and Law; and are from various countries including the United States, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Some contributors knew Thomas Szasz personally and spent many hours with him discussing issues he raised in his books and articles. The book will be fascinating reading for anyone interested in matters of mental health, human rights, and ethics.

Law, Liberty and Psychiatry

Law, Liberty and Psychiatry
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Total Pages: 308
Release: 1989-10-01
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9780815602422

1 copy located in CIRCULATION.

Cruel Compassion

Cruel Compassion
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Total Pages: 290
Release: 1998-02-01
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780815605102

Cruel Compassion is the capstone of Thomas Szasz's critique of psychiatric practices. Reexamining psychiatric interventions from a cultural-historical and political-economic perspective, Szasz demonstrates that the main problem that faces mental health policy makers today is adult dependency. Millions of Americans, diagnosed as mentally ill, are drugged and confined by doctors for noncriminal conduct, go legally unpunished for the crimes they commit, and are supported by the state—not because they are sick, but because they are unproductive and unwanted. Obsessed with the twin beliefs that misbehavior is a medical disorder and that the duty of the state is to protect adults from themselves, we have replaced criminal-punitive sentences with civil-therapeutic 'programs.' The result is the relentless loss of individual liberty, erosion of personal responsibility, and destruction of the security of persons and property—symptoms of the transformation of a Constitutional Republic into a Therapeutic State, unconstrained by the rule of law. Szasz shows convincingly that not until we separate therapy from coercion—much as the founders separated theology from coercion—shall we be able to get a handle on our seemingly intractable psychiatric and social problems. No contemporary thinker has done more than Thomas Szasz to expose the myths and misconceptions surrounding insanity and the practice of psychiatry. Now, in Cruel Compassion, he gives us a sobering look at some of our most cherished notions about our humane treatment of society's unwanted, and perhaps more importantly, about ourselves as a compassionate and democratic people.

The Therapeutic State

The Therapeutic State
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Promtheus
Total Pages: 0
Release: 1984
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780879752422

Chiefly reprints of articles originally published 1965-1983. Includes bibliographies and index.

The Meaning of Mind

The Meaning of Mind
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2002-08-01
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780815607755

This is Szasz's most ambitious work to date. In his best-selling book, The Myth of Mental Illness, he took psychiatry to task for misconstruing human conflict and coping as mental illness. In Our Right to Drugs, he exposed the irrationality and political opportunism that fuels the Drug War. In The Meaning of Mind, he warns that we misconstrue the dialogue within as a problem of consciousness and neuroscience, and do so at our own peril.

Insanity

Insanity
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Total Pages: 436
Release: 1997-04-01
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780815604600

Is insanity a myth? Does it exist merely to keep psychiatrists in business? In Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences, Dr. Szasz challenges the way both science and society define insanity; in the process, he helps us better understand this often misunderstood condition. Dr. Szasz presents a carefully crafted account of the insanity concept and shows how it relates to and differs from three closely allied ideas—bodily illness, social deviance, and the sick role.

Ceremonial Chemistry

Ceremonial Chemistry
Author: Thomas Szasz
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Total Pages: 316
Release: 2003-10-01
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9780815607687

Responding to the controversy surrounding drug use and drug criminalization, Thomas Szasz suggests that the "therapeutic state" has overstepped its bounds in labeling certain drugs as "dangerous" substances and incarcerating drug "addicts" in order to cure them. Szasz shows that such policies scapegoat certain drugs as well as the persons who sell, buy, or use them; and 'misleadingly pathologize the "drug problem" by defining disapproved drug use as "disease" and efforts to change the behavior as "treatment." Readers will find in Szasz's arguments a cogent and committed response to a worldwide debate.