CrossCurrents - The Journal of Addiction and Mental Health articles from March 2003

CrossCurrents - The Journal of Addiction and Mental Health archives from March 2003

Note from the editor.(Editorial)
March 22, 2003... THE IDEA OF A CONNECTION BETWEEN creativity and mental illness has a long history. Thinkers as early as Aristotle have wondered why so many prominent people have been afflicted with mental illness--Michaelangelo, Tennessee Williams, Sylvia...

CAMH's 5th anniversary. (News from the Centre).
March 22, 2003... March 2003 marks our 5th anniversary. We are planning a year's worth of celebration, with a kick-off in March, and various activities throughout the year. When CAMH was created in 1998, no one could have known how significant this merger would...

Madness and Arts 2003 World Festival explores the mind through the arts. (News from the Centre).
March 22, 2003... Tickets are now on sale for the first-ever Madness and Arts 2003 World Festival being held March 21-30 at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto. The festival is being presented by the Workman Theatre Project and CAMH, with generous support from...

Awareness campaign for French-speaking ethnoracial communities. (News from the Centre).(Brief Article)
March 22, 2003... In November, the Honourable Lincoln Alexander, chair of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, was our guest of honour at the launch of the Health Promotion and Prevention Action Plan for French-speaking communities. In partnership with...

Community project addresses ethnocultural mental health. (Profile).
March 22, 2003... AFTER LIVING IN REFUGEE CAMPS FOR NINE YEARS, MOVING to Canada was a relief to Asha * and her seven children. Life is much better where they live in Edmonton, but Asha still experiences psychological trauma from her past in Somalia. And the...

New test can determine newborn's alcohol exposure. (News).
March 22, 2003... A NEW TEST FOR NEWBORNS THAT REVEALS WHETHER A mother drank alcohol during pregnancy promises earlier diagnosis of and intervention for alcohol-related problems in children. The procedure, developed at the Motherisk fetal toxicology lab at the...

Alternative milieu empowers clients, boosts staff morale. (News).(housing and care for mentally ill children )
March 22, 2003... "COME SEE MY ROOM, COME SEE MY ROOM!" DONNA * is excited about her bedroom, which is part of a new unit at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). The Integrated Rehabilitation Unit (IRU) is designed to provide care for clients with...

Quitting smoking requires many supports. (News).
March 22, 2003... EVERYONE'S AN EXPERT WHEN IT COMES TO DISPENSING advice on the best way to stop smoking. Some suggest going cold turkey. Others opt for hypnosis or counselling. Nicotine Replacement Therapies (NRT), such as the nicotine patch and nicotine gum,...

Get high now, suffer mental illness later. (Research Update).(marijuana use linked to depression and schizophrenia)(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Three new studies reported in the British Medical Journal offer more evidence that frequent, heavy smoking of marijuana increases susceptibility to depression and schizophrenia. A six-year study of nearly 2,000 adolescents from 44 schools in...

Alcohol, not tobacco, linked to breast cancer. (Research Update).(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Drinking one glass of alcohol per day is enough to boost breast cancer risk in women, while smoking does not, according to researchers in the United Kingdom. They analyzed data from 53 studies involving 58,515 women with breast cancer and...

Unearthing new risk gene for schizophrenia. (Research Update).(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Researchers have uncovered a variation of a gene called Nogo, overexpressed in schizophrenia, which suggests why certain individuals may develop the disease. University of Toronto researchers analyzed DNA samples from blood samples and...

Coffee lovers may ward off diabetes. (Research Update).(coffee habit and type 2 diabetes risk)(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Heavy coffee drinkers are less likely to develop diabetes than light or non-coffee drinkers. Researchers in the Netherlands followed 17,111 Dutch men and women, aged 30 to 60, from 1987 to 2000. Those who drank more than seven cups a day were...

Gender doesn't affect antidepressant outcome. (Research Update).(effectiveness of antidepressants)(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Different types of antidepressants seem to be equally effective in men and women, according to a recent study. American researchers analyzed data collected over a 20-year period from nine different antidepressant studies. They concluded that...

Job loss taxes mental and physical health. (Research Update).(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... The financial strain and loss of personal control accompanying job loss are responsible for the related downward spiralling in mental and physical health, suggests new research out of the University of Michigan. The two-year study of 756 people...

Older drinkers may do better in treatment. (Research Update).(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... Older individuals with alcohol dependency adhere more to medication and therapy than younger individuals, according to researchers at the University of Pennsylvania. The researchers followed 183 clients being treated for alcohol dependency over...

Link between sexual harassment and eating disorders. (Research Update).(Abstract)
March 22, 2003... New research shows a link between sexual harassment and eating disorders among women that is mediated by psychological stress, self-esteem and self-blame. Only one study to date has examined a possible link between sexual harassment and eating...

Demons and muses: debunking the myth of the mad genius. (Focus).(investigating the psychological aspects of creativity)
March 22, 2003... "It's a mistake to think because you are mentally ill you will have access to the unconscious more than other people. I deny it. I think it is the artist that has the access. Creativity is the artist at work, not the illness at work." ...

Educating through the arts: world festival celebrates the essence of madness and art. (Focus).(mental health arts festival)
March 22, 2003... "free acting lessons." Jody Braybrook recalls the tug of emotions she felt, staring at a flyer that had been delivered to her hostel. She was scared at the prospect of having to walk through the doors of a psychiatric institution to get in...

Sex, drugs and rock 'n roll: support programs help artists make music without drugs. (Focus).
March 22, 2003... It would come down to six rye and Cokes. That's what Peter *, a Juno award-winning Canadian musician, would drink to calm down enough to play in front of a crowd. By the time it came to play, I would just literally be wired," says Peter. "The...

Painting a path to well-being: art therapy helps children of war mend the wounds. (Focus).
March 22, 2003... Mohammad *, 12, is the oldest in a group of refugee children that I visited at a Toronto-area reception centre for recently arrived refugees. Mohammad has taken a long time over his painting of a pink-roofed house with a large tree beside it....

Art and social activism: an interview with Bud Osborn. (Q&A).(Interview)
March 22, 2003... Bud Osborn is a well-known West Coast poet, musician and teacher who lives and works in Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside. He is also a long-time political activist who once collected 26,000 votes in a run for Vancouver city council....

OCD: the War Inside.(obsessive compulsive disorder)(Movie Review)
March 22, 2003... WASHING YOUR HANDS. CHECKING THE STOVE. COUNTING, cleaning and ordering. We all do these things, but when they're taken to an extreme--ore than an hour a day of obsessing and compulsive performing various rituals--then it's a problem. A...

Art Works in Mental Health. (downloaded).(web sites on art therapy for the mentally ill)(Brief Article)
March 22, 2003... Similar to the work of the Workman Theatre Project at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Art Works in Mental Health works throughout the United Kingdom to promote and showcase the creativity of people with mental illness. The program...

Relational disorders: disease of the month? (The Last Word).(classification of mental disorders)
March 22, 2003... MOVE OVER, FOLIE A DEUX (A.K.A. SHARED PSYCHOTIC Disorder); you've got company. The American Psychiatric Association (APA) is setting a research agenda for a future DSM-V with a new category--"Relational Disorders." At first glance, it seems...

Conferences.(Calendar)
March 22, 2003... CANADA Fetal Alcohol Exposure: Time to Know, Time to Act April 10-11, Toronto, Ontario Contact: Best Start, 180 Dundas St. W., Ste. 1900, Toronto, Ontario M5G 1Z8 tel (416) 408-2249 ext 266 toll-free (800) 397-9567 ext 266...

Dangerous deconstructions. (Editorial).(Editorial)
March 22, 2003... The idea for this issue of CrossCurrents focusing on feminisms and religion began over a year ago at a conference honoring Rosemary Radford Ruether. The idea raised two concerns for me. The first is found in feminism and its meanings. While...

What went wrong? Feminism and freedom from the prison of gender roles.
March 22, 2003... In his novel The Town Beyond the Wall, Elie Wiesel tells the story of a time when God and humans changed places and the human, now God, refused to revert to the original order. But after infinite amounts of time, "The past for one, and the...

The problem of anti-Judaism in Christian feminist biblical interpretation: some pragmatic suggestions.
March 22, 2003... My intention in this essay is to make some pragmatic suggestions for engaging in feminist biblical interpretation that does not perpetuate, reinforce, or create anti-Jewish theological constructions. My suggestions are not always easy to put...

Feminism, the body, and the machine.
March 22, 2003... Some time ago Harper's reprinted a short essay of mine in which I gave some of my reasons for refusing to buy a computer. Until that time, the vast numbers of people who disagree with my writings had mostly ignored them. An unusual number of...

Conspicuous in their absence: women in early christianity.
March 22, 2003... In recent decades, a great deal of work has been done to reconstruct our understanding of the ancient world and the early church, particularly in regard to the women who participated in early Christian communities. Enriched by interdisciplinary...

No longer nailed to the floor.
March 22, 2003... I remember writing one of my first essays in womanist ethics a few years ago, and I remember the pain that I experienced in doing so. Writing is already painful, but writing from my own black woman's perspectives adds a stratum to that distress...

Prayer Against the Darkness. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... Prayer Against the Darkness Shekhina Pray for us now bound with scripture and shielded with shawl Armed with passion and loving care Pray for us now against suffering, turmoil, and injustice...

The Fork in the Road. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... The Fork in the Road Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not. When you come to a fork in the road, take it, Robert Frost and Yogi Berra said. I should have stood in bed, my old art teacher on more than one...

There is a Song for You. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... There is A Song For You There is a song for you That the world has been Remiss in singing. I too have often forgotten its melody. It has been your whisper In the night that has spoken To rivers that would not flow. It was...

Church History. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... Church History One thing seems certain, those who hurt you most, as you stumble on from age to age, come from within not from without, and will insist, with heartfelt regularity, how much they cherish you, even as they tear you...

Anointings. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... Anointings Those tongues that thronged on Pentecost have never ceased, have hardly taken time to swallow, draw one gasping breath since then. They sound forth in each and every throbbing wavelength gathered in by human ears even,...

Lithesome Legs and Long. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... LITHESOME LEGS AND LONG Aesthetics ever subjective we choose beauty where discerned-magnify the fetish of the body. Statuesque and feminine anatomy we praise- lithesome legs...

Country Baptism in Fishing Creek. (Poetry).(Poem)
March 22, 2003... Country Baptism in Fishing Creek A sepia photo circa 1910 in a schoolgirl album stuffed with valentines shows hundreds on a river bank, their faces brown against the sallow trees and river. They watch one man in a white suit...

Contextualizing Rosemary.
March 22, 2003... What better time to explore models of liberating pedagogy than in the midst of war? The man in the White House is now asserting his right to dominate the world in the name of God, goodness, and American freedom. What better time to think about...

Ecofeminism: a Latin American perspective.
March 22, 2003... In Christian churches in Brazil, while it is hard to be a feminist, it is harder to be an ecofeminist. I think that is the same in all Latin American countries. Our Latin Christian tradition stressed deeply not only the dependence of women on...

At the end of an era: a meditation on ecumenism, exile and gratitud.
March 22, 2003... The practice of exile is deeply rooted in Jewish history, stretching back to ancient times and traversing context and place. Its backdrop has been forced dislocation, suffering and death. Today a new exile is being created and practiced, but...

Teaching feminist theology to college students: the influence of Rosemary radford ruether.
March 22, 2003... I am honored to be here to say a few words about Rosemary Ruether's contributions to feminist theology. I first became acquainted with Rosemary's work when I was a graduate student at the University of Chicago in the 1970s and feminist theology...

Wise woman bearing gifts.
March 22, 2003... This is a conference honoring and celebrating the gifts of a very wise woman! She comes from the "west" and not from the "east" and, as far as I know, does not ride on a camel. But the gifts that she has brought to all of us and to the Christ...

Economizing Family Values. (Books).(Hitting Home: Feminist Ethics, Women's Work, and the Betrayal of "Family Values")(Book Review)
March 22, 2003... Hitting Home: Feminist Ethics, Women's Work, and the Betrayal of "Family Values" Gloria H. Albrecht Continuum 2002, $22.95 (cloth). THAT CATCH PHRASE of conservative politics. "family values," has been discredited in the minds of...

Jewish solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement. (Books).(Out of the Ashes: The Search for Jewish Identity in the Twenty-First Century; O, Jerusalem: The Contested Future of the Jewish Covenant)(Book Review)
March 22, 2003... Out of the Ashes: The Search for Jewish Identity in the Twenty-First Century By Marc H. Ellis, London: Pluto Books, 2002, $22.50 (cloth). O, Jerusalem: The Contested Future of the Jewish Covenant By Marc H. Ellis, Minneapolis:...

Postcolonial hell: a survey. (Books).(The Writer and the World: Essays)(Book Review)
March 22, 2003... The Writer and the World: Essays By V. S. Naipaul, New York: Alfred A. Knopf 2002, $30.00 (cloth) MONTY PYTHON FANS will recall the scene from The Life of Brian where a band of moronic terrorists from the "People's Front of Judea"...

True or false reform? (Books).(Popes and Politics: Reform, Resentment, and the Holocaust)(Book Review)
March 22, 2003... Popes and Politics: Reform, Resentment, and the Holocaust By Justus George Lawler, Continuum International, 2002, $24.95 (cloth). IN A LETTER APPEARING in the Sunday New York Times (February 2, 2003), Justus George Lawler refers to an...

About the cover art.
March 22, 2003... The Borghese series is a photo essay on the subject of the "Paulina" sculpture by Canova which is in the Borghese Gallery in Rome. The model for the sculpture which was executed in the early 1800s was Countess Paulina Bonaparte Borghese who was...