Of Others Inside: Insanity, Addiction And Belonging in America

Of Others Inside provides a new sociological understanding of the relationship between social exclusion and mental disability. Comparing mental disease and addiction, as well as two institutions set up to deal with both, Darin Weinberg shows with great insight and detail our treatment of the mentally ill and socially ostracized. Of Others Inside examines the way insanity became synonymous with other afflictions: homelessness, drug addiction, and alcoholism. He links this phenomenon with the transformation of addiction treatment from a redemptive process (through Alcoholics Anonymous and other quasi-religious social networks) to a punitive one, by showing the connection between addiction rehabilitation centres and the criminal justice system. Weinberg examines the general social condition of the homeless in the US, examining questions about American perceptions of poverty. Lastly, he offers an ethnography of one rehabilitation centre, Canyon House, and a sister organization, Twilights, and how they treat psychological problems and addictions among the homeless.Arguing that there is a middle ground in the debate about mental illness – it is neither a social construct nor simply a medicalized condition – Weinberg offers a combination of theoretical and ethnographic insight that will impact the way we understand our approaches to addiction, recovery, and social exclusion.