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The arts have a long and storied history of fame and mental illness: most notably, Vincent Van Gogh, who suffered from anxiety, depression, and epilepsy, or Ernest Hemingway, who battled with alcoholism and manic depression throughout his life. Though medication has become a popular method in treating mental illness, storytelling can be equally important in the treatment process as a way of including an individual’s experience within the larger clinical practice. In Stories of Mental Illness: Psychiatry, Medicine, and Literature, ExCollege Visiting Lecturer Susan Lanzoni has students analyze modern psychiatric practice by “looking at different genres to explore the way we understand illness through narratives both within and without the medical fields.”
With a PhD in the history of science from Harvard University and a current teaching position at Harvard University’s School of Continuing Education, Professor Lanzoni approaches the question of analyzing current medical practice surrounding mental health through a historical lens. Beginning in the early 19th century with the rise of mesmerism, the course progresses through the spread of neurology in the late 19th century and ends with the more modern medical issues of autism and schizophrenia.
Professor Lanzoni seeks to bridge the divide between doctors and patients by pairing readings of medical case studies with narratives from the patients themselves.
For example, when students read Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s famous short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” they will also read source material from Perkins Gilman’s doctor about his treatment plan for the debilitated author, allowing students to analyze how the author’s experience, seen within her own lightly fictionalized narrative, compares to her doctor’s notes on her depression.
From reading classic stories of Edgar Allan Poe to watching modern films portraying schizophrenic patients, Stories of Mental Illness aims to involve students in a holistic approach towards issues in mental health. Assignments center on active engagement in class, such as ungraded weekly reflection papers and a final assignment, in which students can choose to write as a historical or analytical paper, or more creatively, as a memoir or graphic novel. However, the key concept remains the same: to gain “sensitivity to narrative as an important way of understanding other people’s experiences.”
As the author of the recent book, Empathy: A History, which chronicles the creation of the term “empathy” from its german roots in the early 1900s through its adoption into American psychological practice, Professor Lanzoni draws upon her research throughout the course. “I think empathy has been used as a way to get at others' experiences that are very different from ours,” she said.
“Empathy is an undercurrent of the course. The class looks at many different kinds of narratives and patient documents, and uses empathy, along with historical understanding, as methods for accessing this material.”
Though the class is not intended exclusively for psychology or pre-med students, Professor Lanzoni hopes that any future practitioners in the course take notice of these nuances within patient experience. “The modern doctor-patient relationship is fraught,” she remarked. “This course addresses important questions for medical practitioners today like how doctors can better listen to patients, or how patient stories sometimes give information that might be overlooked by doctors. Essentially, the course explores what it means to have this human encounter, both historically and today.”
Editor’s Note:
Susan Lanzoni recently published an article in The Washington Post, titled Why empathy is the key to dismantling white racism.
At the beginning of the semester, students in the course also attended the opening of The Many Faces of Our Mental Health, an ongoing installation at the Collaborative Learning & Innovation Complex (CLIC) at Tufts University. The exhibit is part of Stigma Unstuck: A Mental Health Arts Series at Tufts.
About the Author
Emma Hodgdon is a senior studying English literature. Apart from reading Gothic fiction, she can be found practicing cello for the Symphony and Chamber Orchestras, or dancing with the university’s ballroom dance team. She spends her free time experimenting with calligraphy, learning to speak Chinese, and caring for her succulents, Verotchka and Geraldine.
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