Mental Illness in Popular Culture

Description

"Being crazy" is generally a negative characterization today, yet many celebrated artists, leaders, and successful individuals have achieved greatness despite suffering from mental illness. This book explores the many different representations of mental illness that exist—and sometimes persist—in both traditional and new media across eras. Mental health professionals and advocates typically point a finger at pop culture for sensationalizing and stigmatizing mental illness, perpetuating stereotypes, and capitalizing on the increased anxiety that invariably follows mass shootings at schools, military bases, or workplaces; on public transportation; or at large public gatherings. While drugs or street gangs were once most often blamed for public violence, the upswing of psychotic perpetrators casts a harsher light on mental illness and commands media's attention. What aspects of popular culture could play a role in mental health across the nation? How accurate and influential are the various media representations of mental illness? Or are there unsung positive portrayals of mental illness? This standout work on the intersections of pop culture and mental illness brings informed perspectives and necessary context to the myriad topics within these important, timely, and controversial issues. Divided into five sections, the book covers movies; television; popular literature, encompassing novels, poetry, and memoirs; the visual arts, such as fine art, video games, comics, and graphic novels; and popular music, addressing lyrics and musicians' lives. Some of the essays reference multiple media, such as a filmic adaptation of a memoir or a video game adaptation of a story or characters that were originally in comics. With roughly 20 percent of U.S. citizens taking psychotropic prescriptions or carrying a psychiatric diagnosis, this timely topic is relevant to far more individuals than many people would admit. Cover page......Page 1 Halftitle page......Page 2 Title page......Page 4 Copyright page......Page 5 Contents......Page 6 Introduction......Page 10 PART I Cinema: The Big Screen......Page 26 CHAPTER ONE Psychoanalytic Renditions and Film Noir Traditions......Page 28 CHAPTER TWO The Meme of Escaped (Male) Mental Patients in American Horror Films......Page 38 CHAPTER THREE Filming Hallucinations for A Beautiful Mind, Black Swan, Spider, and Take Shelter......Page 48 CHAPTER FOUR Dissociative Identity Disorder in Horror Cinema (You D.I.D.n’t See That Coming)......Page 60 CHAPTER FIVE Spirit Possession, Mental Illness, and the Movies, or What’s Gotten into You?......Page 70 CHAPTER SIX Hitchcock: Master of Suspense and Mental Illness......Page 80 CHAPTER SEVEN McMurphy the Trickster, Foucault, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest......Page 90 CHAPTER EIGHT “Nature Played Me a Dirty Trick”: Illness vs. Tolerance in Gay-Themed Film......Page 102 PART II Television: The Small Screen......Page 112 CHAPTER NINE Women’s Agency as Madness: “The Yellow Wallpaper” to Penny Dreadful......Page 114 CHAPTER TEN Orange Is the New Color for Mental Illness......Page 124 CHAPTER ELEVEN Suffering Soldiers and PTSD: From Saigon to Walton’s Mountain......Page 134 CHAPTER TWELVE Mirth and Mental Illness: Television Comedy and the Human Condition......Page 144 CHAPTER THIRTEEN Mentally Ill Mobsters: From Cagney’s White Heat to Scarface to Bugsy and Crazy Joe......Page 154 CHAPTER FOURTEEN How Traditional Holiday TV Movies Depict Mental Illness......Page 162 CHAPTER FIFTEEN Cotard’s Syndrome in True Detective, Alien Invaders, Zombies, and Pod People......Page 172 CHAPTER SIXTEEN House, Monk, Dexter, and Hannibal: “Super-Powered” Mentally Ill TV Characters......Page 184 PART III Novels, Poetry, Memoirs, and Short Stories......Page 194 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Sanity and Perception in Philip K. Dick’s Clans of the Alphane Moon......Page 196 CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Medea, Mothers, and Madness: Classical Culture in Popular Culture......Page 208 CHAPTER NINETEEN Narratives in The Snake Pit, I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, and Girl, Interrupted......Page 218 CHAPTER TWENTY Edgar Allan Poe’s Unreliable Narrators, or “Madmen Know Nothing”......Page 230 CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Lovecraft and “An Open Slice of Howling Fear”......Page 238 PART IV Comics, Art, Graphic Novels, and Video Games......Page 248 CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO Mind Games: Representations of Madness in Video Games......Page 250 CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE Graphic Narratives: Bechdel’s Fun Home and Forney’s Marbles......Page 258 CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR The X-Men as Metaphors: When Gayness Was Illness......Page 268 CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Arkham Asylum’s Criminally Insane Inmates and Psychotic Psychiatrists......Page 278 CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX Halfworld’s Loonies in Rocket Raccoon Comics—Serious or Satire?......Page 290 CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN Van Gogh and the Changing Perceptions of Mental Illness and Art......Page 302 CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT From the Beats to Jean-Michel Basquiat: Cultural Madness and Mad Art......Page 312 CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE “Autists” and Merchandising “Autistic Art”......Page 324 CHAPTER THIRTY Slipping into Silent Hill: Transnational Trauma......Page 334 PART 5 Music, Musicians, and Musical Theater......Page 344 CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE Kurt Cobain, Nirvana, and Generation X’s Suicide Symbol......Page 346 CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO Metallica, Heavy Metal, and “Suicide Music”......Page 356 About the Editor and Contributors......Page 366 Index......Page 372