BEYOND THE CONTROL OF THE “TOTAL INSTITUTION”. THE CASE OF THE HOSPITAL FOR PATIENTS WITH EPILEPSY IN SEVLIEVO IN 1948

Georgi Todorov

Abstract

The author aims to examine the theories of the founders of medical anthropology Michel Foucault and Erving Goffman on the control and repression of the “mentally disabled people” in psycho neurological hospitals and to trace their implementation in practice. For this purpose, a case study is presented from the hospital for epileptics in Sevlievo at the dawn of the socialist state. A crime committed at the beginning of 1948 reveals numerous elements of the patients’ lifestyles, the actions and working methods of the hospital’s management, the intervention of representatives of the central government. For the first time, archival data from the archives of various institutions and the Ministry of Public Health and Social Care will be introduced into academic use.

Keywords: total institution, control, medicalization,  psychoneurological hospital

sp. Antropologia_11_2. Georgi Todorov