Anthropology and psychiatry—An alternative approach

Abstract

Whilst anthropology has employed an approach to society derived from Freud, the dominant perspective, as exemplified by Durkheim, has been to understand social processes without recourse to psychological theories. These two appraoches have offered opposing explanations of the genesis and significance of public symbols. The later developments of the Durkheimian position, notably symbolic classification and the structural anthropology of Lévi-Strauss, have however returned to a consideration of mental processes in bypassing the study of individual variation. The point of interaction of this approach with the reintroduced individual may offer a new point of definition for transcultural psychiatry. An illustration is offered by examining the experiences of a black West Indian in Britain.