{"product_id":"the-weariness-of-the-self-diagnosing-the-history-of-depression-in-the-contemporary-age","title":"The Weariness of the Self: Diagnosing the History of Depression in the Contemporary Age","description":"Depression  once a subfield of neurosis  has become the most diagnosed mental disorder in the world. Why and how has depression become such a topical illness and what does it tell us about changing ideas of the individual and society? Alain Ehrenberg investigates the history of depression and depressive symptoms across twentieth-century psychiatry  showing that identifying depression is far more difficult than a simple diagnostic distinction between normal and pathological sadness - the one constant in the history of depression is its changing definition. Drawing on the accumulated knowledge of a lifetime devoted to the study of the individual in modern democratic society  Ehrenberg shows that the phenomenon of modern depression is not a construction of the pharmaceutical industry but a pathology arising from inadequacy in a social context where success is attributed to  and expected of  the autonomous individual. In so doing  he provides both a novel and convincing description of the illness that clarifies the intertwining relationship between its diagnostic history and changes in social norms and values. The first book to offer both a global sociological view of contemporary depression and a detailed description of psychiatric reasoning and its transformation - from the invention of electroshock therapy to mass consumption of Prozac - The Weariness of the Self offers a compelling exploration of depression as social fact.","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44777167814709,"sku":"ByrdShop_0773536256","price":57.04,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/ByrdShop_0773536256_5fa1d603-e146-453d-8699-18acc33c9a77.jpg?v=1768059055","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/the-weariness-of-the-self-diagnosing-the-history-of-depression-in-the-contemporary-age","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}