Book description
Twenty-five years ago one could list by name the tiny number of multiple personalities recorded in the history of Western medicine, but today hundreds of people receive treatment for dissociative disorders in every sizable town in North America. Clinicians, backed by a grassroots movement of patients and therapists, find child…
Why read it?
2 authors picked Rewriting the Soul as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
Hacking is one of the leading thinkers in the field of mental health. This exploration of multiple personality disorder helped me to think about similar cultural phenomena, including today’s significant increase in trans-identified teens.
Hacking doesn’t tell you whether he thinks MPD is “real” or not, but he dives deep into beliefs about memory and mental illness. I found his writing compelling and clear.
The brilliant Rewriting the Soul was published in the mid-1990s when the diagnosis of multiple personality disorder was booming, particularly in the USA. The text reflects these times in its focus on the sciences of memory from the late 19th century. Hacking links discussions on memory, trauma, and consciousness in the study of multiple personalities in the 1980s and relates these to earlier discussions on ‘double consciousness’ in the 19th century. He argues that contemporary liberal societies have become obsessed with individual memory and how to analyse and assess it. Hacking skilfully weaves together historical and philosophical perspectives to explore…
From Bonnie's list on the making of the modern self.
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