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How would you describe the history of mental asylums
How would you describe the history of mental asylums
How would you describe the history of mental asylums
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Total Institutions
In the year 1961, the author, Erving Goffman, published a book consisting of text and studies on mental patients and inmates, in what he has called “total institutions”. There is a large focus on the life of mental patients, due to his year long study in an American institution. However, the center of my reading was based on the institutions and the lifestyles that are reached when placed in such establishments.
When describing these institutions the author referred to them as segregated communities. This is exactly what they are. One is cut off from the outside society, with little or no contact at all until the inmates stay is over. The character of these institutions is one that is an intimidating barrier to the outside world. One who’s barriers could be as simple as a fence or a locked door, but as distinct and scary as the high walls, thick bars and razor wire topped, electrically protected fences of today’s top penitentiaries. Every institution provides a new world to its members, in most successful cases, changing the perception and reality of the inmate.
Through the years of research conducted by the author, Goffman concluded that the total institutions in our societies breakdown into five rough groupings. There is room to expand on each one of these groupings as these findings are not precise, interpretation is the key when classifying the establishments. His first conclusion was to classify all institutions that were established to care for people who were incapable and harmless to themselves and one another. One may relate to these institutions as the may be part of our lives on a daily basis. This may be the nursing home where the elderly, widow/widowed grandmother/father is living out his last fine days on this earth. It could be one of the less than desirable child rearing homes, such as an orphanage. Or this category may also include where the unfortunate, the wanderer, and the vagrant all congregate, our nations homeless shelters. Whatever the institution may be, it is defined by a place where one may go to receive treatment, nourishment and attention when there may be no other opportunity afforded them.
The second of these groupings, encompasses all of the institutions that care for people who are inca...
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...s schedules are all imposed by the officials that run the institution. The goals of the institution are fulfilled by these schedules and the tasks that are completed by the inmates, whether it may be a work service crew maintaining the grounds or by a janitorial staff maintaining the interior. Even though these institutions are similar in many instances to others, the do however have more contact with the outside world and rely on that contact to enhance its abilities to rehabilitate.
Total institutions are ones that will take away and identity and not ask questions. One where inmates are moved as managed group and looked down upon as secretive and bitter. Treating one like they are inferior and, guilty and weak is no way to re-establish someone’s life and return them to the world. Total institutions are incompatible with family , which is one of the strongest values that we need to maintain in this disintegrating world environment. We need to embrace family and do what we can to maintain our natural family values all throughout our travels and daily life.
1961 erving goffman asylums; essays on the social situation of mental patients and other inmates
A reality where the prisoner is dehumanized and have their rights and mental health abused. “I have endured lockdowns in buildings with little or no heat; lockdowns during which authorities cut off the plumbing completely, so contraband couldn’t be flushed away; and lockdowns where we weren’t allowed out to shower for more than a month” (Hopkins 154). A prisoner currently must survive isolation with improper shelter in the form of heat. Issues compound with a lack of running water and bathing, a proven severe health danger, especially for someone lacking proper nutrients such as a prisoner in lockdown. These abuses of physical well being then manifest into damage of prisoners’ mental well being. “Perhaps I should acknowledge that the lockdown-and, indeed, all these years-have damaged more than I want to believe” (Hopkins 156). Even for the experienced prisoner the wrath of unethically long lockdowns still cause mental damage. Each and every isolation period becomes another psychological beating delivered as the justice system needlessly aims to damage the already harmed inmates. The damage is so profound inmates even recognize the harm done to them by their jailors. An armed and widely used psychological weapon, the elongated lockdown procedures decimate mental health each and every time
Spending time in an overcrowded cell really lowers your social stability throughout time. Many of the prisoners tend to turn anti-social because they do not want to put up with the conditions in which they live. According to Terence T. Gorski the prisoners tend to develop an illness known as Post Incarceration Syndrome which is something developed through extreme confinement and lack of opportunity. The inmates are more often than not given very little opportunities to rehabilitate themselves with everyday things such as working and receiving an education in the overcrowded prisons. These prisoners are not given enough opportunity to assemble with one another because time is very strict and limited inside the prison walls. Resources are often stretched out to accommodate to everyone’s needs.The inmates tend to get treated in a very inhuman way, resulting in negative consequences. Dealing with the overcrowdedness of the prisons leads to the build-up of stress. Like every human being the prisoners will eventually get very tired of dealing with these conditions and will reach their melting point. When something like this occurs the inmate will most likely receive negative consequences such as complete solidarity. On the contrary being in an isolated cell for about 23 hours a day allows for the prisoners to ponder upon the choices
The cells in which inmates are kept are very small; they have a toilet, a shelf, a desk and a bed that contains a thin mattress (Shalev, 2011). Inmates are not allowed to have physical contact with their visitors. In fact, they cannot even see them face to face in certain facilities. Inmates cannot participate in any work activities, and only if the facility offers it can they receive small amounts of educational programs on a television on a secured circuit (Shalev, 2011). The only time inmates are permitted to leave their cell is to exercise inside a caged enclosure for about an hour a day. Most cells contain a solid door with a single slot so that inmates may be cuffed or received their meals. Also, depending on the facility they may have a small rectangular window in their cell that is extremely small. The most common way that inmates communicate is through shouting because the cells are set up so that no contact can be made to other inmates.
The past two decades have engendered a very serious and historic shift in the utilization of confinement within the United States. In 1980, there were less than five hundred thousand people confined in the nation’s prisons and jails. Today we have approximately two million and the numbers are still elevating. We are spending over thirty five billion annually on corrections while many other regime accommodations for education, health
You cannot do close to anything that you do on the outside as you do on the inside. Besides eating and sleeping and you can only do that inside of a prison when you are told to. You cannot have a social life inside of prison unless you are mingling with people who committed similar or worse crimes then you did. Although you can attend school while being incarcerated it is nothing like attending a regular class with people and interacting with classmates and professors. Research states that the labeling theory comes dangerously close to claiming that the main causes of crime do not matter. Once you are labeled there is no turning back from what they have stamped on your
closely regulated by the government in order to maintain a safe housing unit for inmates.
ALTERNATIVES TO INCARCERATION Valerie Hinton It is undeniable that mass incarceration devastates families, and disproportionately affects those who are poor. When examining the crimes that bring individuals into the prison system, it is clear that there is often a pre-existing pattern of hardship, addiction, or mental illness in offenders’ lives. The children of the incarcerated are then victimized by the removal of those who care for them and a system which plants more obstacles than imaginable on the path to responsible rehabilitation. Sometimes, those returned to the community are “worse off” after a period of confinement than when they entered.
and out of the prison system, the control of (or lack there of) by prison
Elderly Culture and Nursing Homes Nursing homes offer a wide range of long-term care assistance for older adults to be able to meet their everyday needs. Older adults from different cultural backgrounds experience conflict with their decision to participate in a nursing home, catalyzing the underlying stigma different cultures hold towards nursing homes. In many cultures, older adults look for family as their primary source of care. However, when their needs cannot be met due to disability and mental health issues, it begins to take a toll on the person’s instrumental activities of daily living (IADL). IADLs are complex daily actions that are needed to live (Cavanaugh & Blanchard-Fields, 2015).
Assisted living is an effective type of care facility programmed towards helping older individuals with their increasing disabilities. “The fit between individual capacity and the availability of satisfying activities within an environment is an important aspect of positive aging and an especially salient issue for ALF [Assisted Living Faculty] management, given the role of activities in the consumer selection of assisted living”.2 This isolation of this quote is “positive aging”. Positive aging is important since it leads individuals to have a happier and more fulfilling life, and it can be supported through everyday activities and through the living environment. In nursing homes, each individual needs help with making sure that they are given care that meets their needs. This varies through different states and also communities. The purpose of the quote is to show that each person should be evaluated individually, meaning everyone needs a different approach to deal with the aging process.
Upon growing older there are many decisions to be made. Among one of the most difficult and perhaps most important decisions is where the elder person will live and how long-term care needs will be met when he/she is no longer capable of doing so independently due to the incapacity that accompanies many with old age. Nursing homes seem to be the popular choice for people no matter the race, gender, or socioeconomic status with 1.5 million Americans being admitted to them yearly.[3] Because nursing homes are in such a high demand and are not cheap, $77.9 billion was spent for nursing home care in the United States in 2010 alone, they are under criticism of many professions including the legal profession, which is in the process of establishing elder law as a defense to issues with in the elder community. Nursing homes have a duty to provide many things to the elderly including medical, social, pharmaceutical, and dietary services so that the individual may maintain the highest well-being possible.[4] Stated another way 'a nursing facility must care for its residents in such a manner and in such an environment as will promote maintenance or enhancement of the q...
As the current prison structures and sentencing process continues to neglect the issues that current offenders have no change will accrue to prevent recidivism. The issue with the current structure of the prison sentencing process is it does not deal with the “why” the individual is an social deviant but only looks at the punishment process to remove the deviant from society. This method does not allow an offender to return back to society without continuing where they left off. As an offender is punished they are sentenced (removal from society) they continue in an isolated environment (prison) after their punishment time is completed and are released back to society they are now an outsider to the rapidly changing social environment. These individuals are returned to society without any coping skills, job training, or transitional training which will prevent them from continuing down th...
The correctional system is based on helping offenders become part of society and not commit any crimes. Many prisons begin the correcting criminals since they are inside the jails, but many prisons do not. Prisons provide prisoners with jobs inside the prison where they get very little pay close to nothing and many have programs that will help them advance their education or get their high school diploma. There are various programs prisons provide to prisoners to help them get a job or have a skill when they are released from prison. In contrast, prisons that do not provide programs or help to prisoners rehabilitate and enter society again will be more likely to commit another crime and go back to jail. The Shawshank Redemption prison did not
Prisons have been around since the 1500s but from watching different movies and reading books before they were what they are today facilities, people would be put in things such as dungeons. Imprisonment is the main form of punishment or rehabilitation in the United States. It is known that the United States has the highest level of imprisonment. “Prison building efforts in the United States came in three major waves. The first began during the Jacksonian Era and led to widespread use of imprisonment and rehabilitative labor as the primary penalty for most crimes in nearly all states by the time of the American Civil War. The second began after the Civil War and gained momentum during the Progressive Era, bringing a number of new mechanisms—such as parole, probation, and indeterminate sentencing—into the mainstream of American p...
prison is a facility in which inmates are forcibly confined and denied a variety of