Abstract
The globalization of biomedicine poses the problem of finding cross-culturally valid criteria for mental health. Undue pathologization is a major risk for global health, especially when diagnoses rely exclusively on Western nosology. This article focuses on the clinical conflation between involuntary mass possession and conversion disorder. Originally, the diagnosis of “conversion disorder” evolved from the notion of hysteria. Even though the category of hysteria disappeared from psychiatry many decades ago, some of its undergirding assumptions have survived under the new label of conversion. Namely, the assumption that hysteria/conversion is caused by repressed sexual desire is still implicit in widespread explanatory models for mass possession worldwide. Drawing upon an ethnography of demonic possession (grisi siknis) among the Afro-Indigenous Miskitos of Nicaragua, I argue that (1) the label of conversion is eurocentric and inappropriate for mass possession; and (2) emic perspectives on mass possession offer a critical counterpoint to rethink Euro-American and globalized understandings of embodiment and desire.
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Notes
Miskitu (Miskitu Bila) is a Misumalpa language, probably connected to the Macro-Chibcha group (Salamanca 2016). Most Miskitos are bilingual Miskitu/Spanish. The ethnography presented here has been conducted in both languages.
In Spanish: “Es como una pelota que nos pasamos entre nosotras.”
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Acknowledgements
This research was funded through a Fyssen Foundation Postdoctoral Grant. The ethnography is based on the author’s PhD thesis (2017), funded by the Martine Aublet Foundation (Musée du Quai Branly), the Institute of the Americas (Institut des Amériques), and the School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS, Paris). I warmly thank my colleague and collaborator at Northwestern, Rebecca Seligman, for her review and comments, and all the research participants, who kindly and courageously shared their demons with me.
Funding
This study was funded by the Fyssen Foundation (Postdoctoral Research Grant); The Martine Aublet Foundation of the Quai Branly Museum (Laureate Research Grant), The Institut Des Amériques (IDA), and the School of Advanced Studied in the Social Sciences (EHESS).
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Canna, M. Visceral Visions: Rethinking Embodiment and Desire in Global Mental Health. Cult Med Psychiatry 47, 132–151 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11013-022-09768-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11013-022-09768-3