1st Edition
Belonging, Therapeutic Landscapes, and Networks Implications for Mental Health Practice
Why are certain places perceived to be therapeutic, to make people feel better about life, about themselves, and about their bodies? Could there be environmental, individual, societal, and attachment factors that come together in the healing process in both traditional and non-traditional landscapes? This observation is particularly important and has implications for the understanding of both healing and disruption in the lives of individuals. In Belonging, Therapeutic Landscapes, and Networks, Dr. Griffith examines factors that influence the intersection of health and place, one’s sense of belonging, and the constructing of therapeutic spaces that minimize psychosocial disruption in our daily lives.
Chapter 1: Theorizing Belonging, Therapeutic Landscapes, and Networks
On Belonging
Therapeutic Landscapes and Networks
Clinical Implications
Chapter 2: The Home Landscape
Theorizing Home Landscapes
My Home Landscape
Home Landscapes, Money, and Racism
Home and the Arts
Home and Cuisine
Home and Music
Parent-Child Attachment in the Home-Space
Trauma and the Home Landscape
Clinical Implications
Chapter 3: The Work Landscape
Workplace Geography
Stress and the Workplace
Work Burnout
Rehabilitation and Dignity
Professional Group Membership
Clinical Implications
Chapter 4: Sacred Spaces
A Brief Historical Review
Early Years of the Barbados Group
Initiating Membership
Church Participation
Clinical Implications
Chapter 5: Travel and Migration
Theorizing Mobility and Home
Voluntary and involuntary Mobility
Leviticus and Voluntary Migration
The Nameless Woman
The Dehumanizing Effects of Migration
Traveling for Inquiry
The Problem of Self-Exile and Alienation
Clinical Implications
Chapter 6: Prisons and Forensic Psychiatric Hospitals
Geography of Prisons and Forensic Psychiatric Hospitals
Caring for Others in the Context of Security
The Exceptionalism of Solitary Confinement
Clinical Implications
Chapter 7: Leisure and Citizenship Groups
Leisure Activities
Citizenship Groups
Clinical Implications
Chapter 8: Conclusion
References
Biography
Dr. Ezra Griffith, MD is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry and African-American Studies at Yale University. In 2001, the Morehouse School of Medicine conferred on him its Doctor of Science degree, Honoris Causa. Dr. Griffith has published widely, with over 140 publications of academic articles, commentaries, and books. He has also carried out significant scholarship over the years in medical anthropology. In 2010, the American Psychiatric Association presented him its Isaac Ray Award for his distinguished achievements in forensic psychiatry. He delivered the Isaac Ray Lecture at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law. In March 2012, he was a visiting professor at the University of Florida, College of Medicine; and in September 2012, he was the Steinberg Visiting Professor of Psychiatry and the Law at the University of Rochester School of Medicine. He has been recently lecturing on medical ethics and on the organizational problems of diversity and inclusion.
"This marvelous book takes us to the beach, the cathedral, the kitchen, the street, all the while chatting about the ways in which these places shape and heal us. Ezra Griffith, the distinguished psychiatrist, is, in these pages, a best friend from childhood, a confidant and confider. You will love this book for its insights and enjoy it for its friendliness! A treasure!"
-Mindy Thompson Fullilove, MD, Hon AIA, Author of Urban Alchemy: Restoring Joy in America’s Sorted-Out Cities
"Belonging, Therapeutic Landscapes and Networks is an exceptional work on a subject not often deliberated in psychiatry. Dr. Griffith extensively discusses belonging in the major areas of our lives and illustrates how important it is through storytelling, case presentations and self-exploration. He is an outstanding writer who engages the reader and is a skilled and seasoned clinician who presents and examines the clinical implications."
-Billy E. Jones, MD, MS, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry New York University
"Dr. Griffith takes us through mental, physical, and spiritual landscapes with their architectures and inhabitants uprooted, alienated, seeking to belong, and sometimes achieving it. The stories he tells and interprets -- from people who are street homeless to those with mental illness in forensic hospitals to those not-belonging, riding undercurrents of race-ethnicity -- are unforgettable. The world just got larger, and it’s the same shape-shifting landscape we’ve always lived in."
-Michael Rowe, PhD, Yale School of Medicine
