192 chapter
feature of medical anthropological writing (Bhattacharyya 1986: 47–49, Nichter
and Nordstrom 1989: 384 and Roseman 1991: 9, 17, 129).- See, for example, Hahn and Gaines (1985), Payer (1988), B. Good and M. Good
(1993), and specifi cally regarding the practice of psychiatry, Rhodes (1991) and
Nunley (1996). - Th e literary examples from the Oxford dictionary for the fi rst meaning of “cure”
range from 1382 to 1623 while examples of the fi fth defi nition range from 1526
to 1872, perhaps indicating a range of time when the sense of cure began to
shift. - Hanks and Hoskin (1995), Redmond (1998).
- Lipton and Cancro (1995: 971–985).
- Callahan (1990); Morrison, Meier and Cassel (1996); Carney and Meier (2000).
- Studies show rates of use of ECT in the United States at around 3% of psychi-
atric admissions between 1975 and 1986 and around 9% of patients with major
depression in the early nineties (Rudorfer et al. 2003: 1867). Among my patient
sample, the rate is around 5–10%. Nunley reports on his own and other research-
ers’ fi ndings that show the rate of ECT use in selected Indian hospitals ranges
from 14% to 50% (1996: 168–169). - English-Malayalam dictionaries off er a variety of terms for the English “cure.”
However, these entries are usually long, Sanskritic neologisms, which translate
into something like “to cause peace to come to an illness,” and I did not observe
these terms being used by informants (Mekkolla Parameswaran Pillai 1995,
T. Ramalingam Pillai 1996). - Much to the point of this chapter, some Americans pay signifi cant sums of
money to receive this same panchakarma treatment for health maintenance and
relaxation at ayurvedic-style health spas in Connecticut and New Mexico. - Most of the examples presented here come from fi eldwork that was conducted in
1997. At that time, the GAMH was in a large, old, somewhat dilapidated house,
an example of classic Kerala architecture that is often depicted in fi lm and popu-
lar culture to represent a traditional image of hearth, home and Malayali identity.
On returning to Kerala in 1999, I found that the GAMH had moved to a larger,
modernist cement structure that resembled an allopathic hospital. I did not spend
enough time at the new facility to thoroughly evaluate how it compared as an
aesthetic environment for healing. Th ere was more space inside the new hospital,
yet treatments at this facility were administered indoors rather than outdoors.
I couldn’t help wondering to what degree modernizing this facility also involved
imitating the architecture of biomedicine and perhaps losing a more aesthetically
engaging environment. - Daniel (1984), Bhattacharyya (1986: 67), Nichter (1987) and Lamb (2000). Ram
(1991) observed that in the Mukkuvar community (from a district of Tamil Nadu
that borders Kerala) people are concerned about maintaining coolness and have
many remedies for counteracting excessive heat. Th ey are especially concerned
about the accumulation of heat in the head and stress that one should apply copi-
ous amounts of cool water to the head when bathing (86). - Halliburton (2004).
- Th is I did only partially so as not to be overly intrusive. For example, I observed
(saw, heard and smelled) but did not participate in the dawn pujas and rituals at
Chottanikkara temple. Like the mentally-affl icted devotees, my assistant Biju
and I ate vegetarian food, which is said to be more calming and cooling, while