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In The Realm Of Hungry Ghosts Summary

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Many have tried to figure out the main cause for drug addiction and abuse. A Hungarian born American-Canadian Dr. Gabor Mate has spent his career coming up with a theory to answer this age old question. Dr. Mate has become extremely well known from his book “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts” about his work in Vancouver downtown eastside of which he has been doing for over twelve years, as well as from going around Canada and the United States giving numerous talks on this topic including a TedTalk. I will go into further detail on his theory and counter arguments against his theory disproving his theory for the one cause on substance abuse.

Dr. Mate discusses his theory stating that childhood trauma is the cause of addiction. Mate believes this …show more content…

Goffman’s theory states that in order to become and have a ‘normal’ or ‘unspoiled’ identity, one must have a better and brighter view of one self in order to recover their spoiled identity. This argument has been linked to Goffman's classic work “Stigma: Notes on the management of a spoiled identity”. Goffman’s theory also discusses how you can overcome drug abuse which requires individuals to adapt to multiple roles, such as a friend or joining a team where you can become a member. Goffman believes that if you can adapt a dramaturgy, an upstage and backstage in an everyday life, it can allow for the healing to begin. This gives us a better understanding how we might recover and work on building a better self-identity (Neale, Nettleton & Pickering 2010). Goffman describes two different identities in his dated, but relevant book in stigma, the “virtual social identity’ as well as the ‘actual social identity”. “Virtual social identity refers to the assumptions strangers hold about a given individual, whereas actual social identity is the identity he or she in fact possesses” (Neale, Nettleton & Pickering …show more content…

Mate has done many interviews on his research and in his interview here in Vancouver with Maurice Agha, he discusses how its beneficial for him to be dealing with people living on the downtown eastside of Vancouver because he has addictions as well, for an example compulsive buying (Agha 2013). He finds this to be helpful because it is easier for his patients to relate to him because they are both addicts, just of different things. I also think this is helpful to a certain extent, however, many might find his opinions and help controversial because he has not been able to completely overcome his addiction, so how is he in the right place to help others with

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I picked Ghosts written by Edwidge Danticat because this story shared precious life experience about how to live in a dangerous place surrounding with a brutal gang look alike “Ghosts”, but still had a positive passion surviving and behaving with those communities. This fiction written by Edwidge Danticat (2008) came with the guy named Pascal who grew up in the Bel-Air, the place where the gang wars, gun fires, drugs and brutal neighborhood take placed (p.1). However, he had prospered family that having a big restaurant as the story said “Pascal’s parents were shop owners and restaurateurs in Bel Air. They had a slightly larger yard than most of their crammed-in neighbors,” (Danticat E, 2008, p.2). He also had a great job at one of the best

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An instructional video entitled "Trauma and Addiction: Crash Course Psychology #31" gave viewers crucial information. The film highlights the correlation underlying trauma and addiction, highlighting how living through tense situations may increase the chance of being addicted to drugs or alcohol. The speaker also discusses how the processing of traumatic events by the brain can result in a variety of psychological problems and coping techniques. The film also gives an overview of several therapy modes used to address trauma and addiction. The purpose of the video is to increase viewers' comprehension of how trauma affects mental health and to give them information on practical therapy alternatives.

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Addiction and drug abuse is used as a way to escape the harsh problems in society.

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Introduction Stigma: Notes on the management of spoiled identity by Erving Goffman, was first published in 1963. As a sociologist, Goffman was primarily interested in the perspective of symbolic interactionism, micro-level interactions especially how individuals present themselves to others as actors in different situations which he saw as analogous to performance on a theatrical stage, thus following a dramaturgical approach to interactions in the social world. In Stigma, the dramaturgical, symbolic interactionist approach is highlighted with Goffman’s analysis of how people convey or conceal social information about themselves, particularly in relation to stigmatized individuals’ attempts to hide their stigma and reduce their stigmatization

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the story which i chose to read is the haitian (‘Ghosts’ by Edwidge Danticat, NOVEMBER 24, 2008). The story reflects the state of the city in which the Pascal family lived. From the noise and the total gangs and the school where the children were creating the art of painting in the national workshops next to the churches and shops. All this and what happened to the Pascal family with the dictatorship. A story in which the pain and patience give the person how to live in these

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Goffman (1997) expresses a stigmatized person as someone who possesses undesirable physical characteristics that are not within the normal characteristics in the group to which he or she belongs. Furthermore he states that this person is consequently reduced in the minds of society from a whole and normal person to a tainted, reduced one. Goffman (1997) argues that normality is a counterpart to stigma. Burke (2007) on the other hand states that society establishes categories, where certain characteristics are considered normal within a category, he refers to this as social identity, which draws a picture of social identity which is based on first appearances, and occurs through mixed contacts, that is, social situations where those stigmatized

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Falk defines existential stigma "as stigma deriving from a condition which the target of the stigma either did not cause or over which he has little control." He defines Achieved Stigma as "stigma that is earned because of conduct and/or because they contributed heavily to attaining the stigma in question. Bruce Link and Jo Phelan propose that stigma exists when four specific components converge, first was Individuals differentiate and label human variations. The second one is Prevailing cultural beliefs tie those labeled to adverse attributes, the third one is Labeled individuals are placed in distinguished groups that serve to establish a sense of disconnection between "us" and "them" and the last is Labeled individuals experience "status loss and discrimination" that leads to unequal circumstances. Stigma is a mark separating individuals from one another based on a socially conferred judgment that some persons or groups are tainted and “less than.”

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Drug abuse is caused by psychological, genetic as well as environmental factors and can have significant damaging effects on health. Psychological factors are associated with the development of drug abuse. Drug abuse often occurs

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