The Gary Null Show - 04.28.15

The diverse ways madness and severe mental illnesses are culturally defined, understood and treated, with Professor Andrew Scull.

Professor Andrew Scull is the Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Science Studies at the University of California at San Diego, and is widely regarded as one of the world’s most preeminent historians on mental disease and the practice of psychiatry. He holds degrees from Oxford, an MA and PhD in sociology from Princeton and completed post doctoral work in medical history from University College London.  Prof. Scull has received many honors including be listed in Who’s Who in America, and sits on the editorial board of the academic journals “History of Psychiatry,” “Medical History” and University of California Press. He has been published in many peer-reviewed journals and has written over twenty books. His latest -- “Madness in Civilization: A Cultural History of Insanity from the Bible to Freud, from the Madhouse to Modern Medicine” -- is a breathtaking journey through the history of madness, severe mental disease and the variety of treatments and looks how medical attempts to define and cure madness are culturally defined.