Making Sense of Madness

This book argues that the experience of 'madness' is an integral part of what it is to be human, and that greater focus on subjective experiences can contribute to professional understandings and ways of helping those troubled by these experiences.

Jim Geekie is a clinical psychologist who has been working for Auckland District Health Board in New Zealand since 1995, mostly in the area of early intervention for psychosis. Before moving to New Zealand, he worked in Scotland and England as a psychologist, and before that he spent a few years living in East Africa, where he was employed as a teacher of psychology and philosophy. John Read is an Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. Before that he worked for twenty years as a clinical psychologist and manager of mental health services - predominantly in services for people diagnosed psychotic in the USA and New Zealand. He is the coordinating editor of Models of Madness: Psychological, Social and Biological Approaches to Schizophrenia (Routledge, 2004) and editor of the journal 'Psychosis: Psychological, Social and Integrative Approaches'.

Introduction. The Subjective Experience of Madness. Making Sense of Madness I: Subjective Experience. Making Sense of Madness II: Lay Understandings. What Does the Public Think About 'Schizophrenia?' Making Sense of Madness III: Scientific/Professional Understandings of 'Madness.' Bringing it all Together. What 'Schizophrenia' Really Is. Where to From Here?