Hwang Hye Jean
Lecturer, Department of Western History, Seoul National University, Korea.
Uisahak. 2019 Dec;28(3):787-820. doi: 10.13081/kjmh.2019.28.787.
This article examines the way in which British psychiatrists defined, categorized, and applied depression in the period between the two World Wars. To analyze the professional understanding and application of the notion, various expert literatures will be analyzed, such as textbooks, medical journals, and medical documents kept in daily practice. Through the analysis, this article suggests that in the interwar decades, the status of depression as a distinct mental disorder was far from established in terms of its definition, terminology, and classification, although the disorder had already become the most prevalent mental illness by the turn of the century. Also, this article argues that the early twentieth century should be recognized as a part of the long evolution through which depression achieves its modernity, beginning in the early twentieth century and ending in the post-war era. Such findings about a specific psychiatric diagnosis can be applied to the explanation of contemporary psychiatry. At least before the Second World War, British psychiatry had not yet entered into its modern phase and was still under the strong influence of the Victorian medical tradition. Thus, this article claims that in order to understand British psychiatry and its characteristics against this historical background, continuity should be stressed rather than modernity.
本文探讨了两次世界大战之间英国精神病学家定义、分类和应用抑郁症的方式。为了分析对这一概念的专业理解和应用，将分析各种专家文献，如教科书、医学期刊以及日常实践中保存的医学文件。通过分析，本文表明，在两次世界大战之间的几十年里，尽管到世纪之交抑郁症已成为最普遍的精神疾病，但就其定义、术语和分类而言，抑郁症作为一种独特精神障碍的地位远未确立。此外，本文认为，20世纪初应被视为抑郁症走向现代性漫长演变的一部分，这一演变始于20世纪初，止于战后时期。关于特定精神科诊断的这些发现可用于当代精神病学的解释。至少在第二次世界大战之前，英国精神病学尚未进入现代阶段，仍受维多利亚时代医学传统的强烈影响。因此，本文认为，为了在这一历史背景下理解英国精神病学及其特点，应强调连续性而非现代性。
