Pathologized, tired and lost : Sociological interpretations of the growth of depressions in late modernity
The article analyzes the emergence of depression as the most frequent mental illness in late modernity. From the sociological existentialism of Peters (2017), he conceives depression as a particular mode of ontological insecurity. He maintains that the increase in diagnoses is understandable based o...
| Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Status: | Published version |
| Publication date: | 2021 |
| Country: | Brasil |
| Institution: | PUC_RS |
| Repository: | Civitas - Revista de Ciências Sociais (Porto Alegre. Online) |
| Language: | Spanish |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:ojs.revistaseletronicas.pucrs.br:article/39002 |
| Online Access: | https://revistaseletronicas.pucrs.br/civitas/article/view/39002 |
| Access Level: | Open access |
| Keyword: | Depression Sociological existentialism Ontological security Late modernity Depresión Existencialismo sociológico Seguridad ontológica Modernidad tardía Depressão Segurança ontológica Modernidade tardia |
| Summary: | The article analyzes the emergence of depression as the most frequent mental illness in late modernity. From the sociological existentialism of Peters (2017), he conceives depression as a particular mode of ontological insecurity. He maintains that the increase in diagnoses is understandable based on three broad interpretative keys linked to transformations in late-modern societies. The first refers to a growing pathologization of anguish associated with the emergence of ways of conceptualizing psychic suffering. The second refers to the deepening of the self-realization imperatives that cause pathologies of the exhaustion of the self. The third highlights the expansion of a multiplicity of reference guides that manifests itself in a loss of meaning of existence. Contemporary depression simultaneously represents a rhetorical, action and sense pathology correlative with figurations of the pathologized, tired and lost subject. |
|---|