Mental Illness in Popular Culture
By: edited by Sharon Packer MD
Edition: 1st ed.
Publisher: Praeger
Published: 2023
Place of publication: Westport, CT
Language: eng
Number of pages: 392
ISBN-13: 9798400684869
Subjects: Film, TV & radio
Description: "Being crazy" is generally a negative characterization today, yet many celebrated artists, leaders, and successful individuals have achieved greatness despite suffering from mental illness. This book explores the many different representations of mental illness that exist-and sometimes persist-in both traditional and new media across eras.  Mental health professionals and advocates typically point a finger at pop culture for sensationalizing and stigmatizing mental illness, perpetuating stereotypes, and capitalizing on the increased anxiety that invariably follows mass shootings at schools, military bases, or workplaces; on public transportation; or at large public gatherings. While drugs or street gangs were once most often blamed for public violence, the upswing of psychotic perpetrators casts a harsher light on mental illness and commands media's attention. What aspects of popular culture could play a role in mental health across the nation? How accurate and influential are the various media representations of mental illness? Or are there unsung positive portrayals of mental illness?  This standout work on the intersections of pop culture and mental illness brings informed perspectives and necessary context to the myriad topics within these important, timely, and controversial issues. Divided into five sections, the book covers movies; television; popular literature, encompassing novels, poetry, and memoirs; the visual arts, such as fine art, video games, comics, and graphic novels; and popular music, addressing lyrics and musicians' lives. Some of the essays reference multiple media, such as a filmic adaptation of a memoir or a video game adaptation of a story or characters that were originally in comics. With roughly 20 percent of U.S. citizens taking psychotropic prescriptions or carrying a psychiatric diagnosis, this timely topic is relevant to far more individuals than many people would admit.
Table of contents: title: Introduction Sharon Packer, MD  Part One Cinema: The Big Screen Chapter 1 Psychoanalytic Renditions and Film Noir Traditions Rosa JH Berland Chapter 2 The Meme of Escaped (Male) Mental Patients in American Horror Films Jeffrey Bullins Chapter 3 Filming Hallucinations for A Beautiful Mind, Black Swan, Spider, and Take Shelter Jocelyn Dupont Chapter 4 Dissociative Identity Disorder in Horror Cinema (You D.I.D.n't See That Coming) Michael Markus Chapter 5 Spirit Possession, Mental Illness, and the Movies, or What's Gotten into You? Sean Moreland Chapter 6 Hitchcock: Master of Suspense and Mental Illness Mark O'Hara Chapter 7 McMurphy the Trickster, Foucault, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Mark O'Hara Chapter 8 "Nature Played Me a Dirty Trick": Illness vs. Tolerance in Gay-Themed Film Eric J. Sterling  Part Two Television: The Small Screen Chapter 9 Women's Agency as Madness: "The Yellow Wallpaper" to Penny Dreadful Laura E. Colmenero-Chilberg Chapter 10 Orange Is the New Color for Mental Illness Mary L. Colavita, Kate Lieb, Alexis Briggie, Sonal Harneja, and Howard L. Forman Chapter 11 Suffering Soldiers and PTSD: From Saigon to Walton's Mountain Haley Gienow-McConnell Chapter 12 Mirth and Mental Illness: Television Comedy and the Human Condition Kristi Rowan Humphreys Chapter 13 Mentally Ill Mobsters: From Cagney's White Heat to Scarface to Bugsy and Crazy Joe Vincent LoBrutto Chapter 14 How Traditional Holiday TV Movies Depict Mental Illness Martin J. Manning Chapter 15 Cotard's Syndrome in True Detective, Alien Invaders, Zombies, and Pod People W. Scott Poole Chapter 16 House, Monk, Dexter, and Hannibal: "Super-Powered" Mentally Ill TV Characters Lisa Spieker  Part Three Novels, Poetry, Memoirs, and Short Stories Chapter 17 Sanity and Perception in Philip K. Dick's Clans of the Alphane Moon Aaron Barlow Chapter 18 Medea, Mothers, and Madness: Classical Culture in Popular Culture Daniel R. Fredrick Chapter 19 Narratives in The Snake Pit, I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, and Girl, Interrupted Jessica N. Lee Chapter 20 Edgar Allan Poe's Unreliable Narrators, or "Madmen Know Nothing" Caleb Puckett Chapter 21 Lovecraft and "An Open Slice of Howling Fear" Eric Sandberg Part Four Comics, Art, Graphic Novels, and Video Games Chapter 22 Mind Games: Representations of Madness in Video Games Shawn Edrei Chapter 23 Graphic Narratives: Bechdel's Fun Home and Forney's Marbles Nicole Eugene Chapter 24 The X-Men as Metaphors: When Gayness Was Illness Mariel Freeman Lifschutz Chapter 25 Arkham Asylum's Criminally Insane Inmates and Psychotic Psychiatrists Sharon Packer Chapter 26 Halfworld's Loonies in Rocket Raccoon Comics-Serious or Satire? Sharon Packer Chapter 27 Van Gogh and the Changing Perceptions of Mental Illness and Art E. Deidre Pribram Chapter 28 From the Beats to Jean-Michel Basquiat: Cultural Madness and Mad Art Morgan Shipley Chapter 29 "Autists" and Merchandising "Autistic Art" Leni Van Goidsenhoven Chapter 30 Slipping into Silent Hill: Transnational Trauma Brenda S. Gardenour Walter Part Five Music, Musicians, and Musical Theater Chapter 31 Kurt Cobain, Nirvana, and Generation X's Suicide Symbol Robert L. Bryant, Daniel Schwartz, and Howard L. Forman Chapter 32 Metallica, Heavy Metal, and "Suicide Music" Adam W. Darlage and Paul "Hoagy" Burton  About the Editor and Contributors Index