voluntary madness lost and found in the mental healthcare system

This time, she voluntarily commits herself to three different facilities most common to U.S. Voluntary Madness is Vincent’s latest undercover exploits. The end result was that she ended up checking herself into a psychiatric ward.Īnd, thus, another idea for immersion journalism was born. Why mention it at all? Both because I do think it merits reading (I will rarely discourage the reading of any book), and also because, by the end of her time of total immersion as a man, Vincent went through a bit of a mental breakdown. I applaud Vincent’s attempts to try to understand the male psyche, but it simply did not carry with it the gravitas of Griffin’s experiment, and in the end, it fell far short of any groundbreaking revelations. However, I feel as though Griffin’s decision to go undercover in an attempt to better understand through experience the pervasive racism of his home turf (he hailed from Dallas, Texas) carried with it more weight and justification than Vincent’s ultimate betrayal of trust placed in “him” by people who weren’t doing anything beyond living their lives. Both books are unique in their earnest attempts to “walk a mile,” one in the skin of another and one in the gender of another.

I’ve yet to read a review of Self-Made Man that doesn’t at some point reference Black Like Me, and rightfully so. The resultant book was…well, I have mixed feelings about this particular work. Vincent’s dedication was a bit less risky, but she truly did immerse herself in her mission. Griffin actually went through a procedure, under medical supervision, to artificially darken his skin for his experiment. It was a level of undercover or “immersive” journalism reminiscent of White journalist John Howard Griffin’s Black Like Me, which documented his 6-week experiment disguising himself as a Black man in the still racially segregated Southern states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia. A few years ago, I discovered journalist and author Norah Vincent through her book Self-Made Man: One Woman’s Year Disguised as a Man The title of the book kind of gives away the plot: Vincent spent a year (18 months, actually), living as a man, doing manly things, hanging out with manly men.

Voluntary madness lost and found in the mental healthcare system