NEWS

Annika Strauss is the contact person for the DAAD-Exchange-Program "A New Passage to India".
For more information and the current write up can be found here.

Consultation hours during the summer semester 2013:
Thursday 4.30 -6 p.m. , starting 4.4.2013

Extra consultation hours: May 31, 2013 (FR) 2-4 p.m.

Advance reservation required by telephone or in person at the secretary's office, tel. 83-27311

CURRICULUM VITAE

10/2010
Magistra Artium in Ethnologie (Ethnology, main subject), Politikwissenschaften (Political Science, first subsidiary subject) und Wirtschaftspolitik (Politics of Economics, second subsidiary subject), Subject of final thesis: “Homeless Madmen/women – Ethnography of a Rehabilitation Project for Mentally Ill Roadside Destitutes in Western India”

since 11/2010
Doctoral candidate of Ethnology at the Institut für Ethnologie (Department of Ethnology)/ Westfaelische-Wilhelms-Universitaet Muenster; doctoral adviser: Prof. Dr. Helene Basu

since 9/2012
Assistant Lecturer at Institut für Ethnologie/WWU Münster


Field Research:
01.03 till 31.3.2007
Internship at ZIPP – Zentrum fuer Transkulturelle Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie (Centre of Transcultural Psychiatry and Psychotherapy) at the Charité (Berlin) under the supervision of Dr. med. E. Wohlfart: student research project with the subject „Perceptions of Possession by Psychiatrist and Psychotherapists Employed in the Clinic of Psychotherapy and Psychiatry/Charité“

09/2008 till 12/2008
Research Internship in an NGO concerned with the rehabilitation of mentally ill roadside destitutes near Mumbai/India sponsored by Heinrich Hertz-Stiftung NRW, Mentor: Dr. Katy Y. Gandevia (Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai)

03/2011 till 02/2012
Field Research in two psychiatric institutions in Mumbai/India, data collection for phd-thesis „Sex-Gender and Psychiatry in Mumbai“, sponsored by Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD)


Publications:
Strauss, A. (2008): Vom Ex verhext. Ein Fallbeispiel aus der Interkulturellen Psychiatrie. In: Ethmundo (6)
In the Internet:http://www.ethmundo.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=240&Itemid=75

Strauss, A. (2010): ''We are like a Family''. Selbst und Person in einer indischen Psychiatrie. In: Ethmundo (16)
In the Internet: http://www.ethmundo.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=546&Itemid=1

Strauss, A. (2011): Ethnografie eines Rehabilitationsprojekts für psychisch kranke Obdachlose im westlichen Indien. Die heimatlosen Verrückten. Hamburg: Verlag Dr. Kovac
Further Information: http://www.verlagdrkovac.de/3-8300-5723-7.htm


Conferences:
International Conference Psychotic Experiences, Religion, and Spirituality, 14^th – 16^th May 2012, Université Paris Descartes, 45 rue des Saints-Pères – Paris: „Workshop: Fieldwork Notes on Religious Psychotic Episodes in Psychiatric Facilities” held together with Tiago Pires Marques (Cermes 3 - Un. Paris Descartes; CEHR – Catholic Un. Portugal) Livia Velpry (Cermes 3 - Un. Paris Descartes), Mônica Nunes (NISAM – Federal University of Bahia)

23. Annual Conference of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Ethnomedizin (AGEM) on 40 Jahre Forschen im Interdisziplinären Arbeitsfeld Ethnologie & Medizin: Rückblick und Ausblicke, held in Heidelberg, 22.-24. October 2010: “ ’They Are Like Our Children’ - The Concept of Rehabilitation in a Non-Governmental Organisation Taking Care of Mentally Ill Roadside Destitutes in Western India”

Presentation at the „4. ethnologisches Symposium der Studierenden“ (4th Anthropological Symposium of Students) at Georg-August-Universität Goettingen: „Losing the Power over One´s Senses?! – A Discussion of Anthropological Interpretations of Possession and its Perception in the Western Context of Psychiatry”


Areas of Interest:
Transcultural Psychiatry and Medical Anthropology, Concept of Person and Self, Public Health, Gender Studies, Anthropology of Institutions, Anthropology of Biomedicine, Economic Anthropology, Learning and Teaching


Hobbies:
Underwaterrugby, Photography; Pilates and Yoga, Improvisational Theatre

TEACHING

Sommersemester 2013

088729 Lektürekurs zur Vorlesung Wissens- und Anwendungsbereiche der Kultur- und Sozialanthropologie (Prof. Dr. Helene Basu; Prof. Dr. Elisabeth Timm)
09.04.-16.07.13, Di 16-18
Note: Subsequent room change ► STU 105 (2.10)
Veranstaltungsbeschreibung und Seminarplan zum Herunterladen

088843 Sex and Gender in Medicine and Psychiatry
17.04.-17.07.13, STU 105 (2.10)
Description of Class and Readings

Wintersemester 2012/13

088720 Begleitseminar zur Vorlesung
15.10.12, Mo 14-16, ULB 202

088740 Einführung in das wissenschaftliche Arbeiten

16.10.12, Di 16-18, ULB 201

Consultation hours during the winter semester 2012/13:

Mo: 16-18 mit Voranmeldung ab dem 22.10.2012

Last consultation hours on 5th of February 2013

Fieldresearch from 13th of February till 2nd of April 2013

I will respond to mails during this period but be prepared that I will be checking my inbox irregulary.

RESEARCH PROJECTS

Annika Strauss graduated (Magistra Artium) in Social Anthropology (Main Subject), Political Science (1st Subsidiary) and Economic Policy (2nd Subsidiary) in October 2010. Her final thesis is titled “Homeless Madmen/women – Ethnography of a Rehabilitation Project for Mentally Ill Roadside Destitutes in Western India” and is based on a field research conducted from September 2008 till February 2009 in an NGO near Mumbai/India. Since November 2010 she is doctoral candidate in Social Anthropology at the Institut für Ethnologie/Westfaelische-Wilhelms-Universitaet Muenster (doctoral adviser: Prof. Dr. Helene Basu). Her research project "Sex-Gender and Psychiatry in Mumbai" is once more placed in the field of Transcultural Psychiatry. It focuses on the question how the category "sex-gender" moulds biomedical practice in two cosmopolitan (public and private) psychiatric institutions in Mumbai/India.

Summary Magister (Master) Project

“Homeless Madmen/women – Ethnography of a Rehabilitation Project for Mentally Ill Roadside Destitutes in Western India”

Up to now the local construction of biomedicine outside western cultures was discussed only in a minority of anthropological studies. This paper takes a close look at the cultural and social structures of a biomedical NGO in Western India which deals with the rehabilitation of mentally ill roadside destitutes. It is based on field data collected during a research which was carried out in 2008/9 in a psychiatric NGO located near Mumbai/Maharashtra.

The ailment of patients, which is treated in this NGO, becomes manifest in psychiatric symptoms on the one hand and in the loss of and separation from their families on the other. Accordingly the ideology of a successful treatment present in this organisation stresses the reduction of symptoms of the mental illness as well as the reunion of the patient with his/her family. This ideology has a major impact on the patterns of action within the organisation.

The ideal of a ‘healed’ mentally ill roadside destitute refers significantly to the Indian concept of a complete, ‘normal’ person: in the Indian context ‘thinking’ of a person without thinking of his/her social relations is almost impossible. Due to a lack of resources in the Indian health system – above all concerning mental health, a reunion with the family is mostly the only chance for the patient to get appropriate (long-term) care and treatment. India suffers from a shortage of public psychiatric institutions – in particular facilities taking care of long-term patients are less. So taking care of chronically ill patients is mainly reflected back on families.

Summary PHD-Project

“Sex-Gender and Psychiatry in India: A Comparative Study of Biomedical Practice in Public and Private Psychiatry in Mumbai Concerning its Engendered/Sexed and Gendering/Sexing Aspects”

The research project "Sex-Gender and Psychiatry in India" is placed in the field of Transcultural Psychiatry. It focuses on the question how the category "sex-gender" moulds biomedical practice in cosmopolitan psychiatric institutions in India. Currently only fragmentary anthropological observations concerning sex/gender aspects in the Indian biomedical psychiatry exist. Psychological and psychiatric studies which examined biomedical practice in connection with sex/gender considered latter primarily as a social variable which influences the biological core symptoms of mental illnesses. Different from these approaches this study considers "sex-gender" as a/n emic category/ies. Adopting Bourdieus theory of habitus the embodied, engendered/sexed and at the same time due to practices gendering/sexing aspects of clinical every day life should be described and analyzed. Here in particular (gendered/sexed) space in psychiatric institutions, gender/sex aspects of diagnosis (in particular addiction and the psychiatric view of “disorders” of gender identity/sexual orientation) and the role of (gendered/sexed) bureaucracy are focused on. Additionally the study compares the aspects of sexed/gendered and sexing/gendering psychiatric habitus in public and and private institutions.