Pink Geraniums!

These pink geraniums were growing around and I had to take this picture 

Lancan made easy

 The best way to understand the writings of  Jacques Lancan is to read what other people have written about him and then proceed to his work. Lancan's work can be best described  as complex. 

Lancan is perhaps the most important psychoanalyst since Sigmund Freud. 

Lancan for beginners by Philip Hill is one of those books. its quite easy to understand and has a few quirky bits that ease the Lancanian experience. you could a find a preview of the book on Google books. 

http://books.google.co.in/books?id=Xr0-mdvR8uYC&printsec=frontcover&dq=lacan+for+beginners&hl=en&ei=xI_STYCGG9GqrAfU-Yy-CQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

Post modernism and Post Modern psychology

 Post modernism has come to affect us in more ways than we can imagine. Often misunderstood as a nihilistic ideology post modern thought can be quite liberating. Post modern thinkers question long standing notions of identity, art and power. We are forced to evaluate the dichotomies in which have made us divide the world in black and white. However breaking these ideas can be difficult if not impossible to imagine.

Where does post-modern thought emerge from and more importantly when did it begin. Like its philosophy it is hard to point out one point of origin. Post-modern ideas have certainly broken our notions of certainty through a grand narrative and through a good theory of physics. Uncertainty becomes something to be embraced and not feared, it pulls us out of our smugness.

Post modern psychology, if it is possible to have a post modern psychology has to contend with the dichotomy of madness and sanity which are entranced in power and politics. It must question its long standing assumption of speaking the language of the natural sciences.

Psychology is a discipline that is obsessed with being an art which speaks the language of natural sciences and it fails to do both. As a result the psychology we have today fails to do both most research is just recycled common sense or prejudice.  Psychology today is a discipline that has tried to obliterate it past and presents itself as a universal discipline. It treats madness as though it always existed and it needs to be located within the individual. It claims to be apolitical and objective yet is the guiding force behind some of the most oppressive and exploitative polices we have today.

Post modern psychology requires a demise of the expert and the inclusion of the irrational. It requires us to break our ideas of benign therapists, of helping people in distress, of being able to prove things and create universal theories of what human and animal behaviour is.

These are just a few things I have written in a hurry so I have given some quick solutions, however I don’t think there can be any easy solutions when it comes to applying post modern thought. 

this is a link to a small talk a few of my friends had yesterday.
http://www.sendspace.com/file/2eyrxj

KINGS OF CONVENIENCE - 24-25

KINGS OF CONVENIENCE - 24-25

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mgtHRM8t64

This song has been playing in my head since yesterday. I think the rain has brought it on. There is sense of silence and quietness in this song, so much like rain falling dripping of the edge of leaves.

Somehow all Kings of Convenience songs have a dignified quietness and gentleness to them. The music and vocals are magical. Do watch them on youtube or  live of you are lucky.

Journal of Foucault Studies

This is a link to Foucault Studies a free online journal. 


http://rauli.cbs.dk/index.php/foucault-studies/

St Mark's Cathedral Bangalore.

Add caption

St Andrew's Church Bangalore - Stained glass

The Stained glass panels were brought in from Scotland. 

Bottom left to right- Abraham  with his staff, Moses with the 2 ten commandment tablets,  King David with his harp and the prophet Isaiah. 

Middle  left to right-  St Andrew with the cross of St Andrew, St Peter, St Paul and St John.

Top Jesus seated on a throne with the symbols alpha and omega on his left and right.

Central Aisle of the church 

The Stained glass is flanked by the 10 commandments on the left and the LORD's prayer on the right.
The alter stands below a small plaque lies beneath the stained glass. In keeping with the Presbyterian tradition the alter is not elaborately decorated.

St Andrew's Church is  amongst the oldest churches in Bangalore . I have tried to capture the beauty of the stained glass which is almost as old as the church. 

cloudbusting - Kate Bush

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pllRW9wETzw

This is a song from the 80's. the song is quite political ...........  the 80's when music still had something to say

The Right to Health and Sexuality by Dr Akshay Khanna

This is a link to  paper I found by Dr Akshay Khanna. its focus is the Indian scenario and the rather narrow categories that define sexual behaviour and its limited understanding in policy making.

http://www.cehat.org/humanrights/akshaykhanna.pdf

Talk by China Mills at NIMHANS (National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences), Bangalore

Title

Silencing the Voices in your Head? Alternative understandings of Hearing Voices. 

Abstract 
This workshop will explore alternative approaches to understanding the experience of, and working with people who, hear voices, see visions and have unusual beliefs. The workshop will draw upon research by China Mills on the experience of children and young people who hear voices; on the possibilities of understanding and locating distress within people's own frames of reference and their life history, calling for multiple ways of understanding and responding to distress; and on the concept of the 'survivor' within  critical psychiatry. We will explore what it can be like to hear voices; and use stories from people who hear voices  to engage with self help,  coping strategies and the possibilities of recovery.


There are power point slides as well contact me if you want them. 

This is a link to a recording for the talk titled “Silencing the voices in your head”

http://www.sendspace.com/file/6u5t0a

Additional links

hearing voices 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearing_Voices_Network

Rufus May is a clinical psychologist/ psychiatry survivor 

http://www.rufusmay.com/

A short documentary by Undercurrents & Melissa Gunasena

http://www.undercurrents.org/minds/




The Maastricht interview scale
http://www.stemmenhoren.nl/wp/files/Lezingen/20%20Maastricht%20Interview%20-%20english.pdf


About Hearing voices
http://www.hearingvoicesmaastricht.eu/page10.php

Red flowers

Just something I painted sometime back 

A Critique of Research in Psychology.

Research in psychology for a large part states the obvious. Most research studies under the guise of objectivity and scientific methodology reaffirm and strengthen our biases.

Often methodologies used to justify the verification of data. Quantitative methodology is often considered superior as it has numbers both from the sample and as an end result to justify itself. However the method cannot is not a way of correcting faulty ideas. Psychology is built on ideas that are usually biased and only reaffirms theses ideas in a ‘scientific’ manner.

Psychology tends to imitate the methods of the natural sciences and therefore tries to assert its legitimacy as a science. Statistics provide and obvious but sometimes-flawed answer the numbers are right but the premise on which they are based is wrong to begin with. Constructs cannot be measured directly so psychology measures them indirectly almost giving them legitimacy and making them look real. Take for example IQ the very idea of intelligence is debatable and the origins of IQ testing are more political than psychological. IQ rests on a shaky definition of intelligence. However most intelligence tests are said to be quite reliable and valid, are they really? The numbers maybe right but they don’t connect with anything tangible. Unlike a kilogram of iron, which will retain its weight and can be seen and touched intelligence remains a relative term.

 So much research in psychology tries to prove ideas that are inconsequential. Take for example why does one need to establish personality types of different individuals who might share a few common features with other individuals. The very idea that everyone can be classified is a contradiction for the discipline which apparently looks at the individual and appreciates their uniqueness. 

to be continued............ 

Spring In Bangalore - Lal Bagh

A mainstream alternative

Last week as part of the video learning class we had a debate on 

mainstream counseling vs. alternative therapy. The class was divided 

into two groups and after a brief activity the debate began. At the end of 

the debate 2 videos were shown on alternative healing – reflexology 

and hypnotism. 

The term alternative is quite misleading when you think about it. An 

alternative to what? Traditional mainstream system of thought perhaps? 

The first thing that comes to mind is that alternative therapy is practiced 

by an unskilled healer in an unscientific manner, or perhaps alternative 

therapy is just a bit more than a party trick with some mystical element 

thrown in. Whatever the idea it all boils down to the fact that alternative 

therapies whatever they are not a by product of positivist science. Is 

healing (I am using the word deliberately here) can therapy be nothing 

more than what we have come to believe in? Alternate systems rather 

what we call alternative now were once the dominant system of healing. 

Auyuveda, acupuncture, yoga were all validated systems in their era, 

but as notions of illness and the body changed so did the system. The 

current system of treating the body and isn’t always accepted neither 

are all forms of mental health intervention.  

Health insurance is a necessity for most of us these days and that 

ensures that we go to see practitioners who are grounded in the 

allopathic system and are subject to the coldness that goes with the 

sterile course of treatment. But in this current system the practitioner is 

the authority figure who has more knowledge than the sufferer, the 

symptoms take precedence and they need to be treated. System is 

applied to say the mental health you get a system that works almost 

similarly. The client must be treated no doubt but the system can’t 

expand beyond a point it reaches its limit. Now I don’t say yoga has all 

the answers it certainly does not. No system of the body or the mind 

can predict illness or health both concepts are always in a state of flux. 

No system of medicine can prevent an illness it can only make 

assumptions sometimes validated assumptions.  

What heals or cures is a subjective domain rather than a rule. Illness or 

maladjustment will remain, but the nature and definition will continue to 

vary. As new illnesses are invented new systems of cure will emerge 

.But that doesn’t mean that one system of healing is better or dominant 

over the other the use of term alternative and mainstream implies a 

binary opposition. Each system has a point a very valid point the 

methods are different but the goal remains the same – to cure. To 

oppose an older system as primitive or to discard it in favour of a newer 

method only develops a system that is reactionary.  

The goal for a practitioner of health- bodily or mental is not to work for 

the system but for the ever present subject of enquiry the client or the 

patient. 

somewhere in the dark

my artwork

Paraphillic Coercive Disorder.

That’s what we are calling rape these days why punish the criminal when you can let them hide behind a fancy term.  It has become fashionable nowadays to find a psychological cause for everything we cant understand, we need to find a cause within the individual to absolve them from responsibility or to put the blame squarely on their shoulders.

The other day I brought this issue up the issue of medicalising rape with another psychologist who actually thought it might be a good idea. The rapist I am sure had some neurochemical imbalances which made him do it or perhaps it’s a genetic thing getting the rapist to therapy will do him/her wonders. Perhaps we can understand them better, or maybe we can make them see how wrong they are, or maybe we will change them, maybe we can release them from their inner trauma that causes them to rape, maybe maybe………… how naïve does one have to be not to see the stupidity of it all. Why not legalise rape while we are at it, and while we are at it lets look at the trauma a murderer feels when he kills.

The new DSM (diagnostic manual) is planning to include rape as a disorder. Move over victim your rapist needs to get the attention now.  I have gone hoarse pointing out how the mental health system is oppressive but this takes the cake.  The psychiatric institution has never been known for niceness towards its consumers but getting a rapist to sit in for therapy and to take away the autonomy form the crime is collusion between two oppressive forces.

Rape is not a crime of passion to call it paraphillic is absurd philia means love, rape DOES NOT INVOLVE LOVE. Forced sex isn’t sex at all it is an act of asserting power over another person. Though all rapists aren’t men most rape cases involve female victims (we may not have adequate data form male victims), one cant help but look at rape through a power structure – patriarchy.   

I don’t know how many men sat and wrote the new DSM but I have a hunch a large majority had to be men. As for calling a spade a spade the mental health field fails miserably. Why call it rape when you can give it a pretentious Latin name, which is not only misleading but will also take away some of the revulsion one feels with the term rape.  We minimise the seriousness of the crime (I still think it is a crime) by giving it a term very few people are bound to understand. The term rape conjures up violent images but the term Paraphilic Coercive Disorder does nothing of that sort the perpetrator can very easily hide behind the veil of science and obscure language. Lets call it rape and see how many people will want to include it in the DSM. Those in power benefit with the addition of the new diagnosis it allows them to wield greater power over people without actually asserting themselves too much.

In the midst of all this controversy somehow we forgot to ask the victim if they would like to share their therapist with their rapist. 

The politics of child sexual abuse

 Everyone feels sorry to hear stories of a child being abused and for a good reason. Child sexual abuse is probably the worst anyone can do to a child. A child has very little to call his or her own and robbing their bodies of the little dignity they have is shameful and disgusting.

Despite this crime and the outrage that surrounds it a silence exists that keeps the crime under wraps. We speak about sexual abuse in hushed tones or we don’t talk about it at all or we pretend it happens miles away. Despite the shocking statistics we tend to ignore all the signs we give the perpetrators the benefit of doubt. The accuracy of children’s testimonies are questioned making the whole thing look futile.

Often no Action is taken against the perpetrator or even if it is taken it isn’t adequate.  The sad thing is that people in power (adults) often seem to collude with the perpetrators (adults). It is almost as if the child has no say over the misuse of their body. Child sexual abuse exists because the adults who can stop it choose to be silent or are caught up in the politics of who has the jurisdiction.

As a psychologist all you can do is provide a therapy……. why bother with liberation? As listened to the case this young intern presented what I felt was a feeling of absolute hopelessness for the young girl and also at being a psychologist. The field of psychology has colluded with the oppressors for a long time now. Sigmund Freud who was probably the first person to speak about child abuse went back on everything he said.  The social worker, teacher, police can only help you so much and perhaps don’t want to get involved either.   

When it comes down to brass tacks the people who can do something for a child somehow seem to do everything that makes the child feel like its their fault. So dear psychologist the next time you want to do something for a child soften your hearts and think. 

On Animal Farm

Animal Farm

“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others"

George Orwell to me is one of the best writers in English. The subtle horror he induces in the readers mind lingers long after the book is read. Animal farm still haunts me. Apart from noticing the obvious reference to The Russian Revolution there is something darker something more sinister in the treatment of the idea of power. Power is a heady drug the animals embrace the revolution readily but what awaits them is not a new world but a variation of the oppression they knew.

The other horrific idea Orwell leaves the reader with is of animal revolt.  In Orwell’s words

...I saw a little boy, perhaps ten years old, driving a huge carthorse along a narrow path, whipping it whenever it tried to turn. It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their strength we should have no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat.

It’s this very idea that Orwell wants us to dwell on, how an animal rises against oppression and functions just as we do. Turning the power hierarchy upside down can be quite unnerving for the reader. It’s this very idea that makes Orwell stand out, the limit to which he pushes not just his own imagination but also the reader’s imagination. 

The audacity to challenge human power even if it is a work of fiction takes courage. Even though the animals falter we tend to sympathise with their condition because it is our condition as well, and we know it is inescapable.

This is the third element in the novel that horrifies the reader. Replacing one power structure does very little to liberate the animals so much so that in the end the humans and the pigs are indistinguishable. As Benjamin (the donkey) sums it up “Life will go on as it has always gone on — that is, badly.”

Animal farm demands the reader introspects. It deliberately horrifies and the reader and makes the reader ponder about the nature of power. 

Democratic Psychiatry

Democratic Psychiatry, sounds like an oxymoron of Foucauldian proportions but it isn't. Over the years I have heard the silence the mental health profession imposes on its users. It’s not the bad practitioners I am talking about but the good ones. They are probably the most lost here. They get accolades they don't breach ethical boundaries but they don't do any good either.

The practice of mental health requires a belief akin to the belief in God. As long as one believes they have found a way through they come out of the clinic feeling better. Those who question those assumptions, they fall by the wayside and their voices are never heard. Clients who question the practitioner are said to be resistant or worse still their curiosity worked into their symptomatology some unlucky ones get medicated.

As someone once said to me “ you don’t know what it is like to get diagnosed, you loose your sense of self, no matter what you do after that is looked as insane”.  

How many people will have to feel this way before we sit up and acknowledge the gaping holes in our mental health system? When will the client be able to speak and be heard?

Mental health must be looked at from the users perspectives their concerns however trivial must be taken into account. One must consider the damage a diagnosis can cause an individual. It may help some people but what about those who see the label as damaging?  

Practice must look at each individual within their own language rather than fitting the client into the language of psychiatry. How does this work? simple ask and the client will tell you.