Abstract
Graphic medicine, an interdisciplinary field situated at the crossroads of comics and healthcare, operates as a medium through which the intricate nature of experiences with illness can be articulated, challenging orthodox medical dogmatism in an engaging and accessible way. Combining the affordances of comics and the narrative power of storytelling, graphic medicine elucidates the socio-cultural stigmatization of dementia influenced by a multitude of discourses. Diverging from existing discourses that depict individuals with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as zombies, brain-dead, or empty shells, graphic memoirs reconstruct these reductive notions and represent them as imaginative, productive, and perceptive. Taking these cues, the present paper close reads some sections of Dana Walrath’s (2016) Aliceheimer’s: Alzheimer’s Through the Looking Glass in order to demonstrate how graphic medicine reconceptualizes the preeminent hallucinatory experiences of her AD-afflicted mother, Alice, as visions. Walrath deploys collage art to epitomize Alice’s ordeal with AD. In particular, Walrath deploys thought-provoking fragments from Lewis Caroll’s Alice in Wonderland, strategically to proximate Alice’s experiences with AD and tackle the problem of dementia and sociality. Additionally, the paper explores how the text fosters interdependence, respect, and trust to recognize and restore Alice’s personhood. The paper concludes by discussing how Aliceheimer’s operates as an alternative paradigm beyond the confines of biomedical and cultural models of dementia through the use of lexical puissance.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Badcock, Johanna C., Hedwige Dehon, and Frank Larøi. 2017. “Hallucinations in Healthy Older Adults: An Overview of the Literature and Perspectives for Future Research.” Frontiers in Psychology 8 (1134): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01134
Behuniak, Susan M. 2011. “The Living Dead? The Construction of People with Alzheimer’s Disease as Zombies.” Aging Society 31 (1): 70–92. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X1000069
Bercaw, Nancy Stearns. 2016. “Alzheimer’s Disease as an Adventure in Wonderland.” The New York Times, last accessed on 22 March 2023. https://archive.nytimes.com/well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/21/alzheimers-disease-as-an-adventure-in-wonderland/
Berger, John. 1972. Ways of Seeing. London: Penguin Books.
Betancourt, David. 2014. “With ‘Arrugas (Wrinkles),’ Spanish Artist Paco Roca Gives Poignant Voice to Overlooked Seniors.” The Washington Post, last accessed on 19 February 2023. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/comic-riffs/wp/2014/07/11/with-arrugas-wrinkles-spanish-artist-paco-roca-gives-poignant-voice-to-overlooked-seniors/
Bitenc, Rebecca Anna. 2012. “Representations of Dementia in Narrative Fiction.” In Knowledge and Pain, edited by Esther Cohen, Leona Toker, Manuela Consonni, and Otniel E. Dror, 305–29. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Bleathman, Christine. 1988. “Validation Therapy with Demented Elderly.” Journal of Advanced Nursing 13 (4): 511–14. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2648.1988.tb02858.x
Burke, Lucy. 2017. “Imagining a Future Without Dementia: Fictions of Regeneration and the Crises of Work and Sustainability.” Palgrave Communications 3: 52. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-017-0051-y
Chaudhury, Suprakash. 2010. “Hallucinations: Clinical Aspects and Management.” Industrial Psychiatry Journal 19 (1): 5–12. https://doi.org/10.4103/0972-6748.77625
Chidgey, Michael. 2018. “Reciprocal Realities: Dana Walrath’s Aliceheimer’s and the Wonderland Approach to Dementia.” Studies in Comics 9 (1): 127–44. https://doi.org/10.1386/stic.9.1.127_1
Chute, Hillary. 2016. “Comics Form and Narrating Lives.” In The Routledge Auto/Biography Studies Reader, edited by Ricia Anne Chansky, and Emily Hipchen, 295–99. London: Routledge.
Couser, G. Thomas. 2004. Vulnerable Subjects: Ethics and Life Writing. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Czerwiec, M. K., Ian Williams, Susan Merrill Squier, Michael J. Green, Kimberly R. Myers, and Scott T. Smith. 2015. Graphic Medicine Manifesto. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.
DeFalco, Amelia. 2016. “Graphic Somatography: Life Writing, Comics, and the Ethics of Care.” Journal of Medical Humanities 37 (3): 223–40. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-015-9360-6
Doel, Markus A, and David B Clarke. 2007. “Afterimages.” Environmental and Planning D: Society & Space 25 (5): 890–910. https://doi.org/10.1068/d436t
Felski, Rita. 2008. Uses of Literature. Hoboken: John Wiley and Sons.
Frank, Arthur W. 1995. The Wounded Storyteller: Body, Illness, and Ethics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Gadamer, Hans-Georg. 2003. Truth and Method. New York: Continuum.
Goffman, Erving. 1963. Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Grande, Guilia, Chengxuan Qiu, and Laura Fratiglioni. 2020. “Prevention of Dementia in an Ageing World: Evidence and Biological Rationale.” Ageing Research Reviews, 64:101045. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arr.2020.101045
Green, Michael J. 2015. “Comics and Medicine: Peering into the Process of Professional Identity Formation.” Academic Medicine 90 (6): 774–79. https://doi.org/10.1097/ACM.0000000000000703
Green, Michael J., and Kimberly R. Myers. 2010. “Graphic Medicine: Use of Comics in Medical Education and Patient Care.” BMJ 340:c863. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.c863
Holavin, Arturs. 2020. “ ‘You Don’t Need Santa Monica!’ The Objectification of Elderly Care Receivers in Russia.” Europe-Asia Studies 72 (10): 1678–1702. https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2020.1736988
Hardy, Nancy, and Colin Palfrey. 1997. The Social Construction of Dementia: Confused Professionals? London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
Johnson, Christopher Jay. 2017. “Objectification and Commodification of Elders with Dementia.” LinkedIn, last accessed on August 11, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/objectification-commodification-elders-christopher-johnson-phd-/
Kaufman, Sharon R. 2006. “Dementia-Near-Death and ‘Life Itself.’ ” In Thinking About Dementia: Culture, Loss, and the Anthropology of Senility, edited by Annette Leibing and Lawrence Cohen, 23–42. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Kitwood, Tom, and Kathleen Bredin. 1992. “Towards a Theory of Dementia Care: Personhood and Well-Being.” Ageing and Society 12 (3): 269–87. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0144686x0000502x
Kruger, N. 2015. “The ‘Terrifying Question Mark’: Dementia, Fiction, and the Possibilities of Narrative.” In Popularizing Dementia Public Expressions and Representations of Forgetfulness, edited by Aagje Swinnen and Mark Schweda, 109–136. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.
Kukkonen, Karin. 2013. Studying Comics and Graphic Novels. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.
Leandrou, Stephanos, Demetris Lamnisos, Ioannis Mamais, Panicos A. Kyriacou, and Constantinos S. Pattichis. 2020. “Assessment of Alzheimer’s Disease Based on Texture Analysis of the Entorhinal Cortex.” Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience. 12:176. https://doi.org/10.3389/fnagi.2020.00176
Leavitt, Sarah. 2010. Tangles: A Story about Alzheimer’s, My mother amd Me. Calgary, Alberta: Freehand Books.
Malabou, Catherine. 2012. Ontology of the Accident: An Essay on Destructive Plasticity. Translated by Carolyn Shread. Cambridge: Polity Books.
Mandell, Alan M., and Robert C. Green. 2011. “Alzheimer’s Disease.” In The Handbook of Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias, edited by Andrew E. Budson and Neil. W. Kowal, 3–91. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.
Nicholson, Helen. 2011. “Making Home Work: Theatre-Making with Older Adults in Residential Care.” Drama Australia National Journal 35 (1): 47–62. https://doi.org/10.1080/14452294.2011.11649541
Peña-Casanova, Jordi, Gonzalo Sánchez-Benavides, Susana de Sola, Rosa Maria Manero-Borrás, and Marta Casals-Coll. 2012. “Neuropsychology of Alzheimer’s disease.” Archives of Medical Research 43 (8): 686–93. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arcmed.2012.08.015
Purcell, Joann, and Simone Purcell Randmaa. 2022. “Disability Daily Drawn: A Comics Collaboration.” Biography 44 (3): 97–115. https://doi.org/10.1353/bio.2022.a856082
Ramanathan, Vaidehi. 2009. “Scripting Selves, Stalling Last Shadows: (Auto) Biographical Writing of Alzheimer Patients and Their Caregivers.” Critical Inquiry in Language Studies 6 (4): 292–314. https://doi.org/10.1080/15427580903313504
Rees, W. Dewi. 1971. “The Hallucinations of Widowhood.” British Medical Journal 4 (5778): 37– 41. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.4.5778.37
Roca, Paco. 2015. Wrinkles. London: Knockabout Comics.
Rosenberg, Harold. 1975. Art on the Edge: Creators and Situations. New York: Macmillan.
Rüsch, Nicolas, Matthias C Angermeyer, and Patrick W Corrigan. 2005. “Mental Illness Stigma: Concepts, Consequences, and Initiatives to Reduce Stigma.” European Psychiatry 20 (8): 529–39. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eurpsy.2005.04.004
Swinnen, Aagji, and Mark Schweda. 2015. Popularizing Dementia: Public Expressions and Representations of Forgetfulness. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.
Tronto, Joan C. 1993. Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. London: Routledge.
Van Gorp, Baldwin, Tom Vercruysse, and Jan Van den Bulck. 2012. “Toward a More Nuanced Perception of Alzheimer’s Disease.” American Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias 27:388–96. https://doi.org/10.1177/1533317512454707
Venema, Kathleen. 2018. “Remembering Forgetting: Graphic Lives at the End of the Line.” a/b: Auto/Biography Studies 33 (3): 663–86. https://doi.org/10.1080/08989575.2018.1499497
Venkatesan, Sathyaraj, and Raghavi Ravi Kasthuri. 2018. “ ‘Magic and Laughter’: Graphic Medicine, Recasting Alzheimer Narratives and Dana Walrath’s Aliceheimer’s: Alzheimer’s Through the Looking Glass.” Concentric: Literary and Cultural Studies 44 (1): 61–84.
Walrath, Dana. 2016. Aliceheimer’s: Alzheimer’s Through the Looking Glass. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Zimmermann, Martina. 2017. “Alzheimer’s Disease Metaphors as Mirror and Lens to the Stigma of Dementia.” Literature and Medicine 35 (1): 71–97. https://doi.org/10.1353/lm.2017.0003
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Endnotes
1 It should be noted that throughout the article, the term dementia is used predominantly. However, AD is used in relevant contexts.
Rights and permissions
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
About this article
Cite this article
Das, L., Venkatesan, S. “Inside Out of Mind”: Alternative Realities, Dementia and Graphic Medicine. J Med Humanit (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-023-09840-y
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-023-09840-y