Indianizing psychiatry – A critique

Abstract

The issue of culture in Indian psychiatry has endured increasing neglect with the burgeoning biological paradigm. This viewpoint debates and demystifies the connotation of “culture” in mainstream psychiatry. As a template to infer dominant thinking in mainstream psychiatry about culture, DLN Murty Rao Oration in 2011, “Indianizing Psychiatry – Is there a case enough?” by Avasthi (2011) (published in the Indian Journal of Psychiatry) has been used. Engaging a broad interdisciplinary view helps unravel the inherent biases in psychiatry and opens up space for analysis of the Indian psyche from a different philosophic tradition and ways of researching it. Effort here is to open up dialog with cultural psychiatry, make efforts to involve traditional and folk therapies, and use available theoretical and empirical resources within cultural psychiatry for a refined practice of psychiatry in India.