Madness, Politics and Society: Toptaşı Asylum 1873-1927

Abstract

This book review examines Fatih Artvinli’s Madness, Politics, and Society: Toptaşı Asylum 1873-1927, which offers a crucial perspective on the history of psychiatry in Turkey. Artvinli wants to shed light on the political and social history of an empire that was in an effort to modernize by examining the institutional history of Toptaşı Bimarhanesi, which was one of the essential mental hospitals in the last period of the Ottoman Empire. The Mental Hospital, which was established as a product of the modernization process, had a leading role in the adoption of modern psychiatry understanding and methods, from keeping records of people with mental illness to methods of their treatment in the Ottoman Empire, Although Toptaşı Bimarhanesi was transferred to Bakırköy in 1926 as a result of the structural problems of the institution, the psychiatry discourse and practices adopted by it continued to exist within the new institution. Thus, Toptaşı Bimarhanesi has a critical role in shaping the psychiatry understanding of the new regime. This book review claims that despite some limitations, Artvinli’s work makes an important contribution to the literature by presenting a critical perspective, unlike the dominant linear and progressive historiography in Turkey.