*** apologies for cross posting ***

Call for papers: "Mental health and anthropology: local challenges to 
'global mental health'"

Panel at the joint conference “MAGic 2015. Anthropology and Global 
Health: interrogating theory, policy, and practice” (EASA Medical 
Anthropology Network und RAI Medical Anthropology Committee), University 
of Sussex, UK, 9-11 September 2015.

Convenors: Sumeet Jain (University of Edinburgh), Sushrut Jadhav 
(University College London), Claudia Lang 
(Ludwig-Maximilians-University, Munich)

Deadline for Paper Proposals: 27th April 2015

The 'global mental health' (GMH) agenda has emerged as the major driver 
of north-south knowledge transfer in mental health. GMH aims to improve 
access to mental health services in the 'global south' and reduce 
inequalities in care. Two tenets underlie GMH: generation of scientific 
evidence and a human rights discourse. Policy influence derives from 
assembling 'evidence' for mental health interventions and situating GMH 
within global health and development priorities. Medical anthropologists 
and cultural psychiatrists question the cross-cultural applicability of 
the GMH 'evidence' base and the GMH agenda's top-down nature. They argue 
such interventions promote medicalization of distress and edit local 
voices, particularities and healing practices.

Medical anthropologists and culturally sensitive clinicians have argued 
for a bottom-up, radical approach: 'local mental health' (LMH). LMH 
studies of distress and well-being, mental health and healing practices, 
and flows of technologies and expertise challenge the basis of global 
interventions. This approach is thus well placed to critically consider 
relationships between locally rooted alternatives and GMH. This panel 
seeks papers that address the emergence of conceptual, policy and 
programmatic 'local mental health' alternatives to 'global mental 
health'. The panel will address questions such as: What alternatives to 
GMH have been effectively applied? How are GMH ideas appropriated and 
re-shaped by local mental health practice? How might local conceptions 
of distress, well-being and healing be incorporated into mental health 
policy and practice? How are psychiatric nosologies constructed, 
appropriated, translated and resisted? How could voices and concerns of 
socially excluded groups shape mental health policy and practice?

More information:

http://www.easaonline.org/networks/medical/events/magic2015/cfp.shtml

Abstract submission:

http://nomadit.co.uk/easa/magic2015/panels.php5?PanelID=3617

-- 
Prof. Dr. Claudia Lang
Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology
Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich
Oettingenstr. 67
80538 Munich
Germany
tel: +49 (0)89 2180 9605
fax: +49 (0)89 2180 9602

http://www.en.ethnologie.uni-muenchen.de/staff/lecturer/lang/index.html

*************************************************************
*           Anthropology-Matters Mailing List
*  http://www.anthropologymatters.com            *
* A postgraduate project comprising online journal,    *
* online discussions, teaching and research resources  *
* and international contacts directory.               *
* To join this list or to look at the archived previous       *
* messages visit:                                             *
* http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/Anthropology-Matters.HTML   *
* If you have ALREADY subscribed: to send a message to all    *
* those currently subscribed to the list,just send mail to:   *
*        [log in to unmask]                  *
*                                                             *
*       Enjoyed the mailing list? Why not join the new        *
*       CONTACTS SECTION @ www.anthropologymatters.com        *
*    an international directory of anthropology researchers
*
* To unsubscribe: please log on to jiscmail.ac.uk, and            *
* go to the 'Subscriber's corner' page.                                  *
*
***************************************************************