Aradale
Subtitle: the making of a haunted asylum
By: David Waldron, Sharn Waldron & Nathaniel Buchanan
Publisher: Arcadia, an imprint of Australian Scholarly Publishing Pty Ltd
Published: 2020
Place of publication: North Melbourne, Victoria
Language: eng
Number of pages: 171
ISBN-13: 9781925984910
Copyright date: 2020
Subjects: Psychiatric hospitals; Mentally ill; Care; People with mental disabilities; Haunted hospitals; Aradale Psychiatric Hospital
Description: First built in 1867, the remarkable Gothic structure of the former Ararat Lunatic Asylum, colloquially known as Aradale, has overlooked the regional town of Ararat for over 150 years. Throughout its history it has seen remarkable transformations in the history of Australian psychiatry and western society's treatment of the mentally ill, and it has participated in some of their darkest scandals. Today in popular press, the labyrinthine complex is commonly acclaimed as 'Australia's most haunted building' and is home to a flourishing dark tourism industry boasting tens of thousands of visitors a year. This book explores the history of the former asylum, and examines what is it that makes a place 'haunted' in the popular imagination, and what it is about hauntings that so invariably connects them with problematic histories.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.