Seminars (392-0-20)

Topic

Cultures of Care: Mental Health Across Borders

Instructors

Xi Wang
Xi Wang is a Ph.D. Candidate in Sociology at Northwestern University and a trainee at the Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute. Her research explores the transnational circulation of mental health knowledge and practices across institutional, cultural, and national borders through ethnographic methods. In her teaching, she invites students to reflect on personal experience while connecting it to broader social questions concerning science, culture, institutions, and emotion.

Meeting Info

555 Clark 230: Tues, Thurs 2:00PM - 3:20PM

Overview of class

"Cultures of Care: Mental Health Across Borders"

In today's world, we talk more and more about mental health. But what defines "mental health"? Who decides what qualifies as care, and whose knowledge matters? How do diagnoses, therapies, and healing practices travel across cultures, and what social consequences do they bring?

This seminar examines how ideas of mind, distress, and healing circulate across cultural, political, and institutional contexts, taking on new meanings and forms of authority. We begin with examples from the United States and other Western settings, then move outward to the Global South to explore how culture, religion, institutions, politics, economies, and colonial histories shape what it means to be well or unwell in the modern world.

Each week pairs theoretical questions about culture, power, and emotion with case studies of mental health practice, including psychiatry, psychotherapy, self-help cultures, digital wellness, and grassroots activism. Students will learn how suffering and healing are not only private experiences but also social and moral practices embedded in systems of knowledge, institutions, policies, and everyday norms.

The course invites students from all backgrounds to reflect critically and personally on how societies construct normality, illness, and care, and how those constructions shape lives across borders.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this course, students will be able to:
1. Analyze how cultural, institutional, economic, and political forces shape definitions of mental illness and care.
2. Compare and contrast global systems of mental health, including biomedical psychiatry, psychotherapy, community care, and traditional medicine.
3. Develop core skills in social science research, including data collection, analysis, and writing.
4. Reflect on personal experiences of care, wellness, and normalcy, and connect them to broader social theories and contexts.
5. Contribute to a collaborative, inclusive, and intellectually engaging environment for interdisciplinary and cross-cultural discussion.

Teaching Method

A combination of short lectures, seminar-style discussions, and multimedia engagement through films and podcasts when available.

Evaluation Method

- Class participation (20%): Thoughtful and consistent engagement with readings, discussions, and peers.
- Two short response papers (30%): Critical reflections that connect course materials to real-world cases or personal experience.
- Midterm project (20%): Analytical essay or media analysis examining a case of care practice across cultures.
- Final paper or creative project (30%): Independent research exploring one theme in depth (e.g., migrant mental health, therapy economies, digital wellness cultures).

Class Materials (Required)

All materials for this course will be made available on Canvas - no purchase necessary.

Class Attributes

Social and Behavioral Science Foundational Discipl
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area