Deconstructing Psychopathology, Vol. 1

This accessible volume provides a critical perspective on the institutions, practices and presuppositions that underlie the study of 'psychopathology'.

The authors - who come from backgrounds in clinical psychology, psychiatric social work, psychoanalysis, psychology teaching and action research - challenge the traditions of the field. Directing their study to three key areas, they:

· analyze the notion of 'psychopathology' as a conventional term in psychology and psychiatry through the language and institutions that hold it in place

· explore the implications of deconstructive ideas for the theories and practices that sustain clinical treatments

· offer an alternative way of seeing 'psychopathology' and provide accounts of critical professional work and good practice.

Practical and clearly written, Deconstructing Psychopathology will be invaluable reading for students and practitioners across a range of disciplines who are working to understand mental health and distress.

Explores the implications of deconstructive ideas for the theories & practices that sustain clinical trmts/etc.

'Fast becoming a contemporary classic... this book tries both to be critical and engender critical thinking in a number of ways. It offers an overview of a number of theories that address human distress as well as particular forms of "pathology". This book effectively highlights the way that western society has taken "normal"; and "abnormal" emotional states to be factual entities rather than the constructed understandings of human phenomena that they are.... should be on the reading list of every course//module that attends to human distress' - Journal of the Society for Existential Analysis

Ian Parker is a critical psychologist and practising psychoanalyst, working at the interface between theory and practice.

I am a CAT psychotherapist and have been involved with CAT since the late 1980s. I am interested in, and have experience of, a broad range of psychological problems.