Academic literature on the topic 'Biopower, clinic'

In this comprehensive paper, I present the thesis that the clinical biopower—which means biopouvoir according to Michel Foucault—can be countered with the help of artistic ability. In this sense, the psychiatric clinic may turn into a space of inclusion, respect, and true self-unfolding. Following Jean Dubuffet, I give a definition of art brut and analyze some works of German and Austrian outsiders of the 20th century, who succeeded in overcoming life-crises, such as childhood poverty, experiences of war, psychical illness, or social ostracism. I match the biopolitical character of psychiatry clinics against the most recent ideas of art therapy. The remainder of the article is organized in four parts: (1) Introduction: Raw Art, (2) Alterity: Beyond of Normality and Pathology, (3) Talent for Sovereignty, (4) Conclusion: The Between.

This paper examines the sacred status of Thai Buddhist monks who have been engaging with the modern secular healthcare system, which also contrasts with their monastic traditions. It questions how modern medication has affected the sacred figure of Thai monks and what is their reaction to maintain their sacred status in such a secular space? Participant observations and informal interviews have been conducted, and data are conceptualized through the ideas of the birth of the clinic and biopower proposed by Michel Foucault. It finds that the traditional healing previously played by Thai monks has been challenged by modern medication eventually the monks also access the modern hospital. This phenomenon helps to change the idea of the cause of sickness, from demons to germs. This is interesting when some Buddhists request the monastic code-based healthcare system and monk patients’ zone. This paper argues that such an effort aims to maintain the sacred status of monks, who are perceived as holy persons and should not be seen by laypeople especially when they are in sickness, pain, and sorrow, which portray their ordinary human natures. Therefore, zoning management in the government hospital is needed to sacralize the monks’ status.

Drawing on a historical ethnography of how Brazil’s post-dictatorial psychiatric reforms have shaped young people’s lives, this paper builds on Eve Sedgwick’s analysis of the hermeneutics of suspicion to show that narrow applications of Foucault’s biopower concept nurture forms of resistance to bio-reductionism centred primarily on epistemic deconstruction. To unsettle this hermeneutic, I put young people’s theories of power into conversation with Georges Canguilhem’s concept of the milieu and with feminist scholars’ work on prefigurative politics. I introduce the concepts of threading and unthreading to consider how one subject of biopower, the child-like biobehavioural figure, was continuously being threaded within a specific milieu and in relation to another key figure: the elite angst-ridden ‘storm-and-stress’ adolescent. Young people’s subsequent unthreading and reweaving politics, flourishing in co-construction with what I call the politicizing clinic, illustrate how decolonial pedagogies can incrementally change the patterning of social life.

Around the year 1900, there was an emerging scientific interest in man and human behaviour. Among other things, this interest involved a concern about the quality of the population, especially regarding children. A whole scientific movement, the Child Study Movement, emerged in both the Uni­ted States and Europe, revolving around this interest in children. Different experts were united in their concern about the state of the population of children and developed a variety of models and methods to improve the characteristics and health of children. One category concerned the experts in particular: the misbehaved. Drawing on a Foucauldian perspective on biopower, this article explores how psychiatry played an important role in sorting and categorizing schoolchildren in the early welfare state during the interwar years. Society demanded new ways of controlling the population, and biopower – which is about administering the population and maximizing vitality – became a central element of this governing. This article is a contribution to the history of biopower, and this topic is discussed with the emergence and establish­ment of child and school psychiatry during 1910–1955 serving as an example. In this article, it is argued that the involvement of psychiatrists occurred in three steps: as a part of creating and defining new categories of “problem children” within the school system, due to influence from the mental health movement with the establishment of advisory clinics and, finally, through hospitalization and specialization in the 1940s.

Esta tese trata de pensar a ética da escuta clínica em tempos de biopoder. Baseado sobretudo na filosofia esquizoanalítica como intercessora da clínica psicanalítica e na poética de Fernando Pessoa, o estudo definiu como campo problemático a Rede de Atenção Psicossocial brasileira, a partir de variados serviços e intervenções de cuidado que percorreram a atenção à saúde mental, como: Consultório na Rua, Centros de Atenção Psicossocial, Unidades Básica de Saúde, Estratégias de Saúde da Família e Pesquisa na Atenção Básica. Em um contexto de biopoder, produtor de uma subjetividade mínima, entende-se que a escuta volta-se ao corpo como organismo biológico, sem mediação com o desejo. Nesta lógica, a medicalização da vida e o anestesiamento do sofrer, tornam-se as principais práticas de cuidado. No contraponto a este controle capitalístico característico do biopoder, a tese propõe pensar o ato da escuta clínica que se passa na interação junto à potência da desrazão, da loucura e do inconsciente. O ato da escuta clínica emerge aí como dispositivo que se pretende sensibilizador para os acontecimentos inventivos da vida, apoiando cada sujeito, coletivo ou serviço que possui uma angústia a enfrentá-la de maneira inventiva. Trata-se, pois, da criação de dispositivos que lancem cada sujeito a um obrar de si e do mundo. A pesquisa indica que a clínica e o clínico que conduzem o escutar a partir do inconsciente, em sua maquinaria desejante, se posicionam, na acolhida do outro que chega para ser cuidado, em um plano intensivo de dessubjetivação de si e do mundo no que tange à formatação moral exercida pelos mecanismos de controle do biopoder: a anatomopolítica, a biopolítica e a tanatopolítica O ato da escuta clínica implica a ética de questionar um viver conservador, moral e não reflexivo, para disso desviar, inventando outros mundos. Evoca, pois, um devir artista, despersonalização que o plano da arte coloca em jogo quando assombra o mundo com suas novidades que ainda não tomaram forma petrificada. Pautada pelo método cartográfico, a pesquisa se desenrola entrecruzando escritas que se confundem, se misturam, confluem e desfluem à medida que o texto vai ganhando delineamentos. Da escrita dissertativa e acadêmica às narrativas de um conto e de crônicas, que insistem em restar, há um íntimo agenciamento que maquina o escrever sobre a clínica. Tal maquinação inicia-se em um percurso afectivo-experimentativo vivenciado pelo autor que instala um campo problemático a partir do cotidiano das práticas clínicas pelas quais exercitou o escutar. Após este anúncio, é apresentada uma análise sobre os mecanismos do biopoder e a decorrente produção de uma subjetividade mínima, subscrita por um modo narcisista de ser e pela morte do desejo, que invade o cotidiano clínico. Deste pano de fundo passa-se a uma exploração textual que envolve diários de campo sobre intervenções do autor entre seu escutar clínico e uma escuta pesquisante viabilizada pela investigação sobre o cuidado em saúde mental na atenção básica. Por fim, faz-se uma aproximação da clínica com o plano da arte, articulando uma escuta do inconsciente ao ato inventivo que se movimenta na direção de um obrar-se.
This thesis deals with the ethics of clinical listening in times of biopower. The study defined the Brazilian Psychosocial Attention Network as a problematic field based,especially, on the schizoanalytic philosophy, as an intercessor of the psychoanalytic clinics, and in the poetics of Fernando Pessoa. For this purpose, it is considering several services and care interventions that covered mental health care, as:Consultation Offices in the Street, Psychosocial Care Centers, Basic Health Units, Family Health Strategies, and Primary Care Research. In a context of biopower, a producer of a minimal subjectivity, it is understood that the listening turns to the body as a biological organism without mediation with desire. In this logic, the medicalization of life and the anaesthetization of suffering become the main practices of care. In contrast to this capitalistic control characteristic of biopower, the thesis proposes to think of the act of clinical listening that takes place in the interaction with the power of unreason, madness, and the unconscious. The act of clinical listening emerges as a device that is intended to sensitizer to the inventive events of life, supporting each subject, collective or service that has an anguish to face it in an inventive way.It is, therefore, the creation of devices that launch each subject to work on himself and on the world.The research indicates that the clinical and the clinician who lead the listening from the unconscious, in their desiring machinery, are positioned in the reception of the other that arrives to be taken care of in an intensive plan of desubjectivation of oneself and of the world with regard to the formatting morality exerted by the mechanisms of control of biopower: anatomo-politics, biopolitics, and thanatopolitics The act of clinical listening causes the ethics to question a conservative, moral, and nonreflective life, to divert it, inventing other worlds. It evokes, then, a becoming artist, a depersonalization that the plane of art puts at stake when it haunts the world with its novelties that have not yet taken on petrified form. Guided by the cartographic method, the research is carried out by crisscrossing writings that merge, mingle, conjoin, and no longer converge as the text gains its outlines. From dissertation and academic writing to narratives of a short story and chronicles, that insist on remaining, there is an intimate agency that machinates writing about the clinical practice. Such machination begins in an affective-experiential path experienced by the author thatsettles a problematic field based on the daily routine of the clinical practices through which he exercised the listening. After this announcement, it is presented an analysis on the mechanisms of biopower and the resulting production of a minimal subjectivity, underwrote by a narcissistic way of being and by the death of desire, which are common on clinical routine. From this background, there is a textual exploration that involves field journals about the author's interventions from his clinical listening and hisresearcher's listening, enabled by the research on mental health care in basic care. Finally, the clinical practice is approached with the plan of art, articulating a listening from the unconscious to the inventive act that moves in the direction of a work on itself.
Esta tesis trata de pensar la ética de la escucha clínica en tiempo de biopoder. Embasado sobretodo en la filosofía esquizoanalítica como intercesora de la clínica psicoanalítica y en la poética de Fernando Pessoa, el estudio determinó como campo problemático la Red de Atención Psicosocial brasileña, a partir de variados servicios e intervenciones de cuidado que recorrieron la atención a la salud mental, como: Consultorio de Calle, Centros de atención Psicosocial, Unidades básicas de Salud, Estrategias de Salud de la Familia y Pesquisa en la Atención Básica. En un contexto de biopoder, productor de una subjetividad mínima, se entiende que la escucha se vuelve hacia cuerpo como organismo biológico, sin mediación con el deseo. En esa lógica, la medicalización de la vida y el anestesiamiento del sufrir se convierten en las principales prácticas de cuidado. En el contrapunto a ese control capitalístico característico del biopoder, la tesis propone pensar el acto de la escucha clínica que se pasa en la interacción junto a la potencia de la desrazón, de la locura y del inconsciente. El acto de la escucha clínica emerge ahí como dispositivo que se pretende sensibilizador para los acontecimientos inventivos de la vida, apoyando cada sujeto, colectivo o servicio que posee una angustia a enfrentarla de manera inventiva. Se trata, pues, de la creación de dispositivos que impulsen cada sujeto a un obrar de sí y del mundo. La pesquisa indica que la clínica y el clínico que conducen el escuchar a partir del inconsciente, en su maquinaria deseante, se posicionan, en la acogida del otro que llega para ser cuidado, en un plan intensivo de desubjetivación de sí mismo y del mundo en lo que respeta al formateo moral ejercido por los mecanismos de control del biopoder: la anatomopolítica, la biopolítica y la tanatopolítica El acto de la escucha clínica implica la ética de cuestionar un vivir conservador, moral y no reflexivo, para de eso desviar, creando otros mundos. Evoca, pues, un devenir artista, despersonalización que el plan del arte pone en juego cuando asombra el mundo con sus novedades que todavía no se volvieron petrificadas. Pautada por el método cartográfico, la pesquisa se desarrolla entrecruzando escritas que se confunden, se mesclan, confluyen y desfluyen a medida que el texto gana delineamientos. De la escritura discursiva y académica a las narrativas de un cuento y de crónicas, que insisten en restar, hay un íntimo agenciamiento que maquina el escribir a respeto de la clínica. Tal maquinación tiene inicio en un trayecto afectivo-experimentante vivido por el autor que instala un campo problemático a partir del cotidiano de las prácticas clínicas por las que ejercitó el escuchar. Posteriormente a este anuncio, es presentado un análisis sobre los mecanismos del bipoder y la decurrente producción de una subjetividad mínima, subscrita por un modo narcisista de ser y por la muerte del deseo, que invade el cotidiano clínico. De ese contexto se pasa a una exploración textual que involucra diarios de campo sobre intervenciones del autor entre su escuchar clínico y una escucha pesquisante viabilizada por la investigación sobre el cuidado en salud mental en la atención básica. Por fin, se realiza un acercamiento de la clínica con el plan del arte, articulando una escucha del inconsciente hacia el acto inventivo que se mueve en la dirección de un obrarse.

On October 21st , 2005 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that immigration officials “can no longer assess potential immigrants to be ‘medically inadmissible’ to Canada solely on the basis of a person’s disability” and their likelihood to make “excessive demands on Canadian social services” (Chadha 2005, 1). In this thesis I will explore this ruling using a methodological approach that engages practices of: self-reflexivity; tracing historical and political genealogies; and case study analysis. What I am interested in thinking about is how this moment gestures to the necessity of conceptualizing the nation, nationalism, and citizenship as highly medicalized terrains. Through an engagement with transnational and black feminist theorizing, anticolonial studies, and disability studies, I will suggest that “medical inadmissibility” is one of many regulatory mechanisms that work to fashion the Canadian nation-state as white, healthy, fit, and productive.

Under the canopy of cultural geography, Chapter five draws on the resources of critical medical studies and landscape architecture to show how the deep memory of the Sodom story reissues the hospitality question (what are you willing to give up to protect what you think you value most?) in the region historically known as Palestine, even as that very question is currently being subsumed into the engines of biopower promoting the crush of industries in the fragile ecosystem along the southwestern shores of the Dead Sea. The notable symptom of this operation takes shape, perhaps surprisingly, in the region's robust investment in the skincare industry-in particular, the therapeutic regimens for psoriasis, the disorder whose biosemiotic profile and biomedical history quietly point up the shared socio-ethical borders of community and immunity in the figural mooring of Sodomscape.