The Idea of Suicide

Contagion, Imitation, and Cultural Diffusion

• Author(s): Michael J. Kral,
• Publisher: Routledge
• Pages: 144
• ISBN_10: 0429676255
  ISBN_13: 9780429676253
  
• Language: en
• Categories: Political Science / Public Policy / Social Services & Welfare , Psychology / General , Psychology / Applied Psychology , Psychology / Social Psychology , Psychology / Grief & Loss , Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural & Social , Psychology / Psychotherapy / General ,

Description:...

This book is about a new theory of suicide as cultural mimesis, or as an idea that is internalized from culture. Written as part of a new, critical focus in suicidology, this volume moves away from the dominant, strictly scientific understanding of suicide as the result of a mental disorder, and towards positioning suicide as an anthropologically salient, community-driven phenomenon. Written by a leading researcher in the field, this volume presents a conception of suicide as culturally scripted, and it demonstrates how suicide becomes a cultural idiom of distress that for some can become a normative option.