SDG Detail

SOCIOL 703 : Sociology of Mental Health

Postgraduate course

Project description

Interrogates advanced sociological theories of medicine and psychiatry, investigating mental health interventions as social, economic, cultural and political projects. Key issues will include The Enlightenment and theories of the self, the rise of science and the 'psy' professionals, institutionalisation and community care, current sociological theories of mental health, the medicalisation of everyday life, and gender, race and mental illness.

Year 2022

Location New Zealand

Organization University of Auckland

Project aims

Project outcome

Students who successfully complete the course will be able to: � Critically evaluate medicine�s and psychiatry�s focus on behaviour considered �sick� or �abnormal� as part of the more general process of modernity. � Critically assess medicine and psychiatry as social, economic, cultural and political -as well as medical- projects. � Critically evaluate the profession of psychiatry through use of relevant social and sociological theory. � Place medicine and psychiatry within its wider social, cultural, economic and political contexts. � Critically debate current key topics within the sociology of medicine and mental health.