The Politics of Error: Rethinking the Power of the Symptom in the Case of ADHD Diagnosis in Chilean Society
21 Dec 2018-Journal of Social and Political Psychology (Leibniz Institute for Psychology (ZPID))-Vol. 6, Iss: 2, pp 711-727
TL;DR: In this article, a critical approach to the problem of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is developed, and the authors consider the role of the school in contemporary Chilean neoliberal society from a genealogical-affective approximation.
Abstract: This article seeks, mainly, to develop a critical approach to the problem of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and, through this, to rethink the problem of activism and militancy in relation to the power of a symptom linked to a corporality that seems to overflow a determined moral political framework. For this reason, we seek to think of a militancy that intensifies error, as a political power, beyond the search for a specific and universal diagnostic associated with what is understood as evidence. We begin with the description of the emergence of what we have called the ADHD Situation. First, using field notes from a collective ethnographic investigation performed during 2017, we describe the ADHD Situation as an ongoing process. Then we connect it to a broader context by examining the role of the school in contemporary Chilean neoliberal society from a genealogical-affective approximation, trying to avoid substantializing readings. In the second section, we develop this connection, describing the production of the ADHD Situation through the lenses of epistemology, ethics, economics, and politics. We also use here a critical analysis of three key documents that help us chart the institutional development of the disorder: The National Mental Health Plan (2017), the National Children’s Health Program (2015) and the Clinical Guide to Attention Deficit (2009). We demonstrate the existence of an epistemological connivance between macrosocial transformations and the community approach utilized in these documents. This provokes us to think about a militancy capable of trespassing the borders of academia, health definitions, and social interventions through the intensification of the power of error as an opening to radical transformations.
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TL;DR: The field of community psychology has for decades concerned itself with the theory and practice of bottom-up emancipatory efforts to tackle health inequalities and other social injustices, often assuming a consensus around values of equality, tolerance and human rights as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The field of community psychology has for decades concerned itself with the theory and practice of bottom-up emancipatory efforts to tackle health inequalities and other social injustices, often assuming a consensus around values of equality, tolerance and human rights. However, recent global socio-political shifts, particularly the individualisation of neoliberalism and the rise of intolerant, exclusionary politics, have shaken those assumptions, creating what many perceive to be exceptionally hostile conditions for emancipatory activism. This special thematic section brings together a diverse series of articles which address how health and social justice activists are responding to contemporary conditions, in the interest of re-invigorating community psychology’s contribution to emancipatory efforts. The current article introduces our collective conceptualisation of these ‘changing times’, the challenges they pose, and four openings offered by the collection of articles. Firstly, against the backdrop of neoliberal hegemony, these articles argue for a return to community psychology’s core principle of relationality. Secondly, articles identify novel sources of disruptive community agency, in the resistant identities of nonconformist groups, and new, technologically-mediated communicative relations. Thirdly, articles prompt a critical reflection on the potentials and tensions of scholar-activist-community relationships. Fourthly, and collectively, the articles inspire a politics of hope rather than of despair. Building on the creativity of the activists and authors represented in this special section, we conclude that the environment of neoliberal individualism and intolerance, rather than rendering community psychology outdated, serves to re-invigorate its core commitment to relationality, and to a bold and combative scholar-activism.
13 citations
TL;DR: The authors construye una cartografia de los discursos historicos del diagnostico del trastorno del Deficit de Atencion/Hiperativida (TDAH).
Abstract: Este articulo construye inicialmente una cartografia de los discursos historicos del diagnostico del Trastorno del Deficit de Atencion/Hiperativida (TDAH). Enseguida, dos momentos-clave de la historia oficial del diagnostico son analizados: las descripciones del medico ingles George Still, de 1902, y el sindrome de la encefalitis letargica, en la primera mitad del siglo XX. En tales analisis, es dado relieve a los elementos morales y politicos de la historia oficial del TDAH - ellos hacen parte de los niveles mas profundos de la constitucion del diagnostico del TDAH que no son especificados por el discurso medico-cientifico. Las diferentes versiones historicas destacadas y los elementos revelados y ocultados por la historia oficial son vistos como parte de la constitucion del diagnostico del TDAH. Juntos, forman la historia del TDAH con todas sus polemicas y controversias.
10 citations
01 Jan 2011
3 citations
Journal Article•
TL;DR: The ouvrage is organized en six chapitresidents who present a genealogie de ce qui constituera, au fil des decennies, un groupe de nouvelles sciences du comportement humain, les neurosciences cognitives, avec leur projet and des propositions theoriques et pratiques sous forme d'exercices, notamment de therapies breves as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Cet ouvrage est organise en six chapitres qui presentent une genealogie de ce qui constituera, au fil des decennies, un groupe de nouvelles sciences du comportement humain, les neurosciences cognitives, avec leur projet et des propositions theoriques et pratiques sous forme d’exercices, notamment de therapies breves. Dans le chapitre I, Alain Ehrenberg evoque des histoires rapportees de « cerveaux exemplaires » de personnes pourtant considerees comme deficientes selon nos representations de l...
3 citations
References
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01 Jan 2009
TL;DR: The Affect Theory Reader as mentioned in this paper is a collection of essays written by the central theorists of affect, those visceral forces beneath, alongside, or generally other than conscious knowing that can serve to drive us toward movement, thought, and ever-changing forms of relation.
Abstract: This field-defining collection consolidates and builds momentum in the burgeoning area of affect studies. The contributors include many of the central theorists of affect—those visceral forces beneath, alongside, or generally other than conscious knowing that can serve to drive us toward movement, thought, and ever-changing forms of relation. As Lauren Berlant explores “cruel optimism,” Brian Massumi theorizes the affective logic of public threat, and Elspeth Probyn examines shame, they, along with the other contributors, show how an awareness of affect is opening up exciting new insights in disciplines from anthropology, cultural studies, geography, and psychology to philosophy, queer studies, and sociology. In essays diverse in subject matter, style, and perspective, the contributors demonstrate how affect theory illuminates the intertwined realms of the aesthetic, the ethical, and the political as they play out across bodies (human and non-human) in both mundane and extraordinary ways. They reveal the broad theoretical possibilities opened by an awareness of affect as they reflect on topics including ethics, food, public morale, glamor, snark in the workplace, and mental health regimes. The Affect Theory Reader includes an interview with the cultural theorist Lawrence Grossberg and an afterword by the anthropologist Kathleen Stewart. In the introduction, the editors suggest ways of defining affect, trace the concept’s history, and highlight the role of affect theory in various areas of study.
Contributors
Sara Ahmed
Ben Anderson
Lauren Berlant
Lone Bertelsen
Steven D. Brown
Patricia Ticineto Clough
Anna Gibbs
Melissa Gregg
Lawrence Grossberg
Ben Highmore
Brian Massumi
Andrew Murphie
Elspeth Probyn
Gregory J. Seigworth
Kathleen Stewart
Nigel Thrift
Ian Tucker
Megan Watkins
1,552 citations
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TL;DR: The frame of analysis presented here is an elaboration of ideas sketched in Perdue (1984, chapter 7.4), which in turn are based on a number of previous empirical studies of temporality in second language acquisition, notably Klein (1981) and von Stutterheim (1986).
Abstract: In this chapter, we shall explain the way in which the data were analysed. A frame of analysis, such as the one used here, is not a theory which is meant to excel by the depth of its insights or by its explanatory power. Rather, it is an instrument designed for a specific purpose, and to serve this purpose, it should be simple, clear and handy. Moreover, it is allowed to ignore many of the subtleties and complications which a satisfactory theory of temporality and its expression in natural language eventually has to account for. On the other hand, it must not be at variance with such a theory. A frame of analysis, if it is to be more than a temporary crutch, should also be flexible in the sense that it can easily be enlarged, refined and made more precise, whenever there is need to. The frame of analysis presented here is the outcome of several earlier attempts and considerable practical experience. In many respects, it is an elaboration of ideas sketched in Perdue (1984, chapter 7.4), which in turn are based on a number of previous empirical studies of temporality in second language acquisition, notably Klein (1981) and von Stutterheim (1986). During subsequent work, empirical findings have led to many changes, even compared to the project's final report (Bhardwaj, Dietrich and Noyau 1988), although most of these changes do not so very much concern our basic assumptions as terminology and presentation.
1,340 citations
"The Politics of Error: Rethinking t..." refers background in this paper
...This is a great example of what Goffman and symbolic interactionism call the ‘definition of the situation’, understood as a working consensus about the issues at stake and the corresponding behavior (Goffman, 2006)....
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Book•
01 Jan 1979
1,110 citations
"The Politics of Error: Rethinking t..." refers background in this paper
...…way to conduct conducts, which implies an emphasis on the preeminence of the benefits for the conducted, and discipline as vigilance associated not only with punishment but also with the further intention of forming bodies able to comply with a norm of conduct (Foucault, 2006, 2012)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors take the biomediated body to be a historically specific mode of organization of material forces, invested by capital into being, as well as elaborated through various technoscientific discourses.
Abstract: Taking the biomediated body to be a historically specific mode of organization of material forces, invested by capital into being, as well as elaborated through various technoscientific discourses, the article traces these investments and the discursive productions of the biomediated body, linking it to an ongoing reconfiguration of governance and economy.
610 citations