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Perspectives on Erving Goffman’s “Asylums” fifty years on

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Abstract

Erving Goffman’s “Asylums” is a key text in the development of contemporary, community-orientated mental health practice. It has survived as a trenchant critique of the asylum as total institution, and its publication in 1961 in book form marked a further stage in the discrediting of the asylum model of mental health care. In this paper, some responses from a range of disciplines to this text, 50 years on, are presented. A consultant psychiatrist with a special interest in cultural psychiatry and mental health legislation, two collaborating psychotherapists in adult and forensic mental health, a philosopher, and a recent medical graduate, present their varying responses to the text. The editors present these with the hope of encouraging further dialogue and debate from service users, carers, clinicians, and academics and researchers across a range of disciplines.

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Notes

  1. Goffman (1961), p. 7.

  2. Goffman (1961), p. 330.

  3. Carel (2008), p. 73.

  4. Carel (2008), p. 44.

  5. Goffman (1961), p. 73.

  6. I thank an anonymous reviewer for pressing this point.

  7. Chodoff (1984) remains an authoritative summary of the issues and positions in the debate.

  8. Goffman (1961), p. 130.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychotherapy, St Thomas’ Hospital, London, UK

    John Adlam

  2. Department of Paediatrics, Children’s University Hospital, Temple Street, Dublin, Ireland

    Irwin Gill

  3. Department of Philosophy, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Shane N. Glackin

  4. Department of Adult Psychiatry, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Brendan D. Kelly

  5. Mater Misericordiae University Hospital, Dublin, Ireland

    Brendan D. Kelly

  6. Maudsley Foundation NHS Trust, London, UK

    Christopher Scanlon

  7. Department of Psychiatry, St Luke’s Hospital, Freshford Road, Kilkenny, Ireland

    Seamus Mac Suibhne

  8. School of Medicine, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland

    Seamus Mac Suibhne

Authors
  1. John Adlam
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  2. Irwin Gill
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  3. Shane N. Glackin
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  4. Brendan D. Kelly
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  5. Christopher Scanlon
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  6. Seamus Mac Suibhne
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Correspondence to Seamus Mac Suibhne.

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Adlam, J., Gill, I., Glackin, S.N. et al. Perspectives on Erving Goffman’s “Asylums” fifty years on. Med Health Care and Philos 16, 605–613 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11019-012-9410-z

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