You may wonder why Chinese depression? Kleinman, on his paper entitled 'Culture and Depression', uses an image which is the 3 Chinese symbols for depression. This intrigued me, more I think because there is very little imagery that can be associated with depression that is not stereotypical.
Knowing nothing about the Chinese language I researched further and found a website called www.chinese-tools.com and searched for depression in the Chinese-English dictionary. Depression (in psychological terms) consists of the 3 symbols that Kleinman had used as the image on his aforementioned paper. Each symbol has a meaning in its own right and together they form the construct of depression
The 3 symbols used by the Chinese to explain depression as an illness are 'you yu zheng.'
you = worried
yu = melancholy
zheng = illness / disease
you yu zheng = depression
Each symbol is an aspect of depression but it is only when you have the constructs of 'worried', together with 'melancholy' and illness / disease that you than get 'depression'. Within Chinese culture worry on its own, or melancholy alone do not make depression - it is a combination of these emotional experiences that create depression. I wonder how often in modern day western life worry or melancholy alone are assumed to be depression? If they are, is it important? Perhaps - if we then are guilty of medicalising the normal range of everyday life experiences .
Create an illness, the consequence of that means there must be a cure; if there is no cure then a cure needs to be found.......or invent a cure, then create the illness/disease......chicken and egg........big pharmas and the medicalisation of normality, is it healthy? This could be a whole new PhD!
The dictionary definitions of each of the terms is also of interest:
Worried:
WordWeb 2006
1. Afflicted with or marked by anxious uneasiness or trouble or grief
Oxford Dictionary 1998
1. Anxious or disturbed tranquility.
2. Disturbed state of mind, anxiety.
Nuttall's Dictionary 1905
1. Harrassed; fatigued
Melancholy:
WordWeb 2006
1. A feeling of thoughtful sadness
2. A constitutional tendency to be gloomy and depressed
3. A humor that was once believed to be secreted by the kidneys or spleen and to cause sadness and melancholy.
Oxford Dictionary 1998
1. Pensive sadness; mental depression; habitual or constitutional tendency to this.
2. Sad, gloomy.
Nuttall's Dictionary 1905
1. A diseased state of the mind, characterised by great depression and gloomy apprehensions, so called as presumed to be due to an excess of black bile.
2. A gloomy state of mind.
3. Depression of spirits.
Illness:
WordWeb 2006
1. Impairment of normal physiological function affecting part or all of an organism
Oxford Dictionary 1998
1. Ill health, state of being ill.
2. Disease.
Nuttall's Dictionary 1905
1. The state of being ill; indisposition; sickness; moral perversity.
Disease:
WordWeb 2006
1. An impairment of health or a condition of abnormal functioning
Oxford Dictionary 1998
1. Unhealthy condition of body or mind.
2. Illness, sickness; particular kind of this with special symptoms or location.
Nuttall's Dictionary 1905
1. Derangement in the structure or the function of any organ belonging to a vegetable, an animal, or a spiritual organism, or to any organised body such as a state.
Depression:
WordWeb 2006
1. A mental state characterized by a pessimistic sense of inadequacy and a despondent lack of activity
2. Sad feelings of gloom and inadequacy
3. A state of depression and anhedonia so severe as to require clinical intervention.
Oxford Dictionary 1998
1. State of extreme dejection, often with physical symptoms.
Nuttall's Dictionary 1905
1. State of being depressed; a low state
2. A sinking of the spirits.
