Bethel: Community and Schizophrenia in Northern Japan

Karen Nakamura
Assistant Professor of Anthropology and East Asian Studies
Yale University

Scheduled to be opened at the Montreal Ethnographic Film Festival, January 2007.

Abstract: Located in a small fishing town on the northern island of Hokkaido is a small but vibrant group of people with schizophrenia and other psychosocial disabilities. Dr. Nakamura explores the social and cultural accommodations made in order to allow people with severe psychiatric conditions to live in the community―including changes to mental health care, how businesses operate, and relationships with the outside world.