An Invitation from the Aboriginal Health Interest Research Group at McGill:
Not busy on JANUARY 17th at 6PM!? Interested in Aboriginal health, psychiatry, anthropology, sociology or even education?! Come to Thompson House room 406!!!
This will definitely be an interesting talk by expert Dr. Laurence Kirmayer, co-author of Healing Traditions and McGill professor and director of the division of social and transcultural psychiatry! Dr. Kirmayer is well-established and extremely knowledgeable in the areas of aboriginal mental health, mental health care for immigrants and refugees, cultural resilience and many more! In addition, he founded and directs the annual summer program in social and cultural psychiatry at McGill as well as national network for aboriginal mental health research.
Feel free to check out his page at the following link:
http://www.mcgill.ca/trauma-globalhealth/people/canada/kirmayer/Dr. Kirmayer will be giving an interactive presentation on the topics covered in his book including an overview of the mental health of Indigenous peoples; origins and representations of social suffering, transformations of identity and community, and traditional healing and mental health services. Cross-cutting themes will include: the impact of colonialism, sedentarization and forced assimilation, the importance of land for indigenous identity and an ecocentric self; notions of space and place as part of the cultural matrix of identity and experience; and processes of healing and spirituality as sources of resilience.
If any of the above topics sounds like something you would want to know more about or you would just like to engage in discussions concerning these issues, feel free to come by! This presentation might be especially useful and interesting for you if you are planning on spending anytime in an aboriginal community throughout your medical training!
Everyone is welcome! The more the merrier!
Please RSVP to ahig.mcgill@gmail.com, so we know how many people to bring snacks for! Yes, SNACKS WILL BE SERVED!
Here is a little excerpt from the back cover of the book (available at the McGill Library!):
“Aboriginal peoples in Canada have diverse cultures but share common social and political challenges that have contributed to their experiences of health and illness. This collection addresses the origins of mental health and social problems and the emergence of culturally responsive approaches to services and health promotion. Healing Traditions is not a handbook of practice but a resource for thinking critically about current issues in the mental health of
indigenous peoples. “