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The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

1467 Words6 Pages

The spirit catches you and you fall down: A Hmong child, her American doctors, and the collision of two cultures by Anne Fadiman illuminates the dilemmas, as well as barriers, persons of various cultural backgrounds can encounter daily, specifically when residing in a foreign habitation of different practices, perspectives and beliefs. This book highlights the difficulties one family must face during a clash between Hmong family cultural beliefs and western medicine. Fadiman (1997) brings our attention to these harsh realties that one can encounter when persons are unintentionally culturally incompetent through sharing the story of the Lia Lee and her parents, Nao Kao and Foua, who look for guidance from western doctors to assist their spiritual …show more content…

This strong belief against only using medical help was heightened by the doctors frustration towards the Lee family for not following instructions, as well as the difference in perspectives of seeing Lia’s condition as special, the Lee family feeling as if Lia was “like a member of royalty” (Fadiman, 1997, p.22) due to her condition, and the doctors stubbornness to treat it with a multitude of medications with negative side effects. Unfortunately, the combination of not understanding the medication application, as well as conflicting culture beliefs, lead the doctors to think the Lee family was not complying with them, and felt “Lia’s parents were endangering her health” (Fadiman, 1997, p.79) which lead them to contact child services. This process of taking away Lia, which only worsened her condition, could have been handled more appropriately if the doctors had underwent enculturation, being defined as “the process of learning behaviors, languages, beliefs, and roles common to ones first or home cultures” (Barrera et al., 2012 p. xx), this allowing the doctors to not think poorly of the Lia’s parent’s but instead understanding of the cultural beliefs and reasons for them. However, it would be unfair to state the doctors didn’t give the Lee’s the benefit of the doubt, Fadiman (1997) stating that Neil, one of Lia’s doctors, “postponed calling Child Protective Services for as long as he could, giving Lia’s parents every possible chance to reform, talking the case over with his wife every night” (Fadiman, 1997, p.79) and only reported the family under the true impression that he was doing what was in the best interest of

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Summary Of The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

1416 Words | 6 Pages

This book proved that in the end, neither way of thinking was completely wrong or completely right. Both the medical community and the Lees should have sought out ways in which they were able to better come to an agreement. For instance, the medical community could have tried to find a translator for the Lees which could have helped them both determine proper medical procedures. They also could have decided to learn more about the Hmong culture to have some understanding of where the Lees were coming from and avoid any barriers for them to better treat Lia. A big drawback that the medical community made was having a pessimistic outlook to Lia’s critical condition.

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Summary Of The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

565 Words | 3 Pages

‘The spirit catches you and you fall down’ was published in 2012 by essayist and reporter Anne Fadiman. This introductory book review analyzes the way in which different cultures perceive illnesses and diseases. It focuses on the story of the Lees a Hmong family, who moved to the United States and experiences difficulties with language, culture and biomedicine method of healing, which contradict to Hmong’s way of healing. The chapters describe the differences between the ways childbirth is conducted in Hmong society compared to the western society. As well as the struggle the Lees family has with the cultural differences in diagnoses and treatment of their ill daughter.

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Summary Of Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

855 Words | 4 Pages

Anne Fadiman’s professional background is that of the Hmong lifestyle with its cultures against the entire American culture. In his background, there is miscommunication resulting from the refusal of the give medical dosages and other medicines due to the misunderstandings and mistrust. According to Barnsteiner , (p.71), there is also the inability of the US doctors to treat those people deeply rooted in the Hmong culture and they are also unable to learn that culture in the most helpful. Hmong is a refugee family in the US and that is where Ann Fadiman comes from. They come from provinces such as Laos and Sainyabuli which have tried to interact with the healthcare system in California and Merced.

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The Split Horn Summary

511 Words | 3 Pages

In the documentary, “The Split Horn: Life of a Hmong Shaman in America,” portrays the journey of an immigrant Hmong family battling to maintain their cultural traditions alive in the United States. In the Hmong culture, it is believed that every individual has seven souls and if they have an illness, for example sickness, it means that their soul has departed or taken by evil spirits. Hmong people believe in Shamans, who are gifted and respected people who can make contact with their ancestors and return the lost souls of people. In this documentary, the main character Paja Thao is a shaman who is challenged by American customs to keep his cultural Hmong traditions alive and pass it down to his children. Paja becomes sick because he feels like his children don’t care about the Hmong tradition anymore because they don’t participate in his rituals and realizes his children have assimilated to the American culture.

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247 Words | 1 Pages

Within the Hmong culture there is great emphasis on symmetry, balance, and complementary sections in bodies, society, and cosmos. Additionally, the soul must be kept in balance to maintain good health; sadly, the soul of Lia was not kept in good health which lead to severe, poorly-treated epilepsy. The medical mistakes and lack of precise communication ultimately lead to an untimely death of Lia; however, between both parties dealing with Lia’s epilepsy, the severity of her illness could have been prevented if both parties took Eliade’s perspective on sacred space into account during treatment. Sacred space, in terms of Eliade’s perspective, is one of the most critical, cherished topics that defines his paradigmatic model for religion. The

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Summary Of The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

914 Words | 4 Pages

Several chapters in this book are devoted to Hmong’s history, cosmology and the multiple challenges they have faced while trying to settle in the United States. According to Fox (2005), Western medicine is a more reliable and effective way of curing diseases as compared to the traditional, and old-fashioned cultural methods, such as sacrificing pigs and chicken as depicted by the Hmong Lee family. I think that a better and more profound understanding of diverse cultures and their beliefs will play a key role in enabling Western doctors to overcome cultural resistance towards science. Consequently, they will have a more cooperative attitude towards the patients, which will likely change the ancient beliefs as held by some patients. Besides, the societies should not fully trust the cultural healing modalities.

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1617 Words | 7 Pages

In Anne Fadiman’s book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, two cultures clash with each other in the struggle to save Lia Lee, a Hmong child refugee with severe epilepsy. Although Lee and her family live in the United States, and thus receive medical care from Westerners, her family believes that Lee’s condition is sacred and special. The following miscommunications, both culturally and lingually, between the American doctors and the Lee family leave Lia Lee in comatose at the end of the book. However, Lia Lee could have been saved if the Lee’s had a better understanding of the American doctors’ intentions, and the American doctors understood the Hmong culture. Essentially, the tragedy of Lia Lee can be attributed to the clash of American and Hmong cultures at both the surface and sub-surface level.

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Summary Of The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Fadiman

1860 Words | 8 Pages

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman, explores cultural competence, ethics in medicine, and the provision of culturally competent health care in the United States by following a family of Hmong culture in their struggles with mainstream U.S. society and healthcare. Fadiman has implemented her studies to highlight the differences between Hmong and Western practices and perspectives on health care, illness, spirituality, and the body. Through her extensive research, Fadiman is able to express cultural differences and the impact ignoring this crucial piece can have. Healthcare in the U.S. is described as the best in the world, but Fadiman is able to highlight the weaknesses this healthcare system has in regards to culturally

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How Did You Notice Culture Impacting The Health And Illness Course Of Lia Lee

614 Words | 3 Pages

Another critical element is the difference of the two culture in addressing illness. The Hmongs have a Shaman who comes in their home, spends time with the family and the patient. Shamans treat their patient’s spirit as well as the body and can make an immediate diagnosis. The American medical system very different in so many aspects that Fouya and Nao Lee is having a difficult time accepting

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The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down By Anne Fadiman

194 Words | 1 Pages

Have you ever thought about how difficult it might be to go into a different country knowing absolutely nothing, not even language, and something horrific happened to you or anyone in your family?  Don’t you think you would feel so powerless, so helpless, so clueless? This happens commonly and it has never had any attention brought to it, at least not until 1998. Anne Fadiman wrote a book entitled, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. This demonstrated a collision of two complete opposite cultures, but they both have the same goal to help the child get better.

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Analysis Of Midterm: The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down

1960 Words | 8 Pages

Over the progression of the book the view points and relationships between the Lees and the doctors develops slightly. The medical staff was not prepared with a translator or a cultural understanding of the Hmong and how their beliefs would not match up with their medical practices. “Not only do the Hmong fail resoundingly to improve the payer mix- more than eighty percent are on Medi-Cal- but they have proved even more costly than other indigent patients, because they generally require more time and attention, and because there are so many of them that MCMC has to hire bilingual staff members to mediate between patients and providers” (Fadiman 25). This theme in the story was immensely eye opening for all of the cultural gaps that exist throughout the United States. The solution to this problem is for both sides standing on opposite sides of the gap to take the time to bridge the gap together.

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1987 Words | 8 Pages

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