ABSTRACT
Madness poses fundamental problems for every society, past and present. The terms used to describe it–lunacy, insanity, mental disease, mental illness, nervous breakdown, emotional or psychological distress, mental disorder–carry a cargo of cultural meanings and spawn countless social reactions. Although each of these terms invokes a different understanding, the concept and the category of madness serve an essential purpose: they help those not so categorized to feel better about themselves and their presumed normalcy, while at the same time they earmark others as violating society’s expectations and deserving to be targeted by professional and state intervention.
