Sanaullah Khan – författare

This book explores diasporic identities and lived experiences that emerge in global patterns of oppression and considers the consequences of treatment and cure when patients experience mental illness due to war, displacement and surveillance. Going beyond psychiatric institutions and conventional psychiatric knowledge by focusing on informal networks, socially contingent value systems, and cultural sites of healing, this book considers how communities utilize trauma productively for healing. The chapters in this volume consider the detection of mental illness and its treatment through claims to citizenship and belonging as well as denials of social identity and psychic experiences by institutions of the state. A multidisciplinary team of contributors and international range of case studies explore topics such as colonial trauma, feminized trauma, reproductive violence, military mental health and more. This book is an essential resource for psychologists, psychiatrists, political scientists, sociologists and anthropologists, as well as scholars and those involved in policymaking and practice.

This book explores diasporic identities and lived experiences that emerge in global patterns of oppression and considers the consequences of treatment and cure when patients experience mental illness due to war, displacement and surveillance. Going beyond psychiatric institutions and conventional psychiatric knowledge by focusing on informal networks, socially contingent value systems, and cultural sites of healing, this book considers how communities utilize trauma productively for healing. The chapters in this volume consider the detection of mental illness and its treatment through claims to citizenship and belonging as well as denials of social identity and psychic experiences by institutions of the state. A multidisciplinary team of contributors and international range of case studies explore topics such as colonial trauma, feminized trauma, reproductive violence, military mental health and more. This book is an essential resource for psychologists, psychiatrists, political scientists, sociologists and anthropologists, as well as scholars and those involved in policymaking and practice.

This book uses the notion of “discretionary medicine” to explore the landscape of contemporary healthcare in Pakistan. It considers how patients frequently experience health interventions as out of touch with the suffering of everyday life and how healthcare provisions are viewed as intrusive, corrupted, and lacking in empathy towards the sick. The study focuses on mental health, acknowledging that the experience of mental illness in Pakistan is increasingly inseparable from conditions of chronic poverty caused directly by deepening inequality. The chapters address the establishment of priorities by the Pakistani healthcare system in conjunction with global disease programs and investigate the misalignments between the priorities of global institutes and local expectations/realities. It is argued that the discretionary nature of medicine is caused by the remnants of colonial-era laws, which link the maintenance of public health with questions of security. This, the author suggests, frequently contributes to forms of care that are riddled with bureaucratic violence. Using a combination of archival and ethnographic research, the book offers a multi-sited and interdisciplinary perspective on healthcare, ranging from care within low-income households and neighborhoods to diasporic communities and state institutions. It will be of interest to scholars and students of medical/psychiatric anthropology, global health, and history of medicine, as well as South Asian and Pakistan studies.

This book uses the notion of “discretionary medicine” to explore the landscape of contemporary healthcare in Pakistan. It considers how patients frequently experience health interventions as out of touch with the suffering of everyday life and how healthcare provisions are viewed as intrusive, corrupted, and lacking in empathy towards the sick. The study focuses on mental health, acknowledging that the experience of mental illness in Pakistan is increasingly inseparable from conditions of chronic poverty caused directly by deepening inequality. The chapters address the establishment of priorities by the Pakistani healthcare system in conjunction with global disease programs and investigate the misalignments between the priorities of global institutes and local expectations/realities. It is argued that the discretionary nature of medicine is caused by the remnants of colonial-era laws, which link the maintenance of public health with questions of security. This, the author suggests, frequently contributes to forms of care that are riddled with bureaucratic violence. Using a combination of archival and ethnographic research, the book offers a multi-sited and interdisciplinary perspective on healthcare, ranging from care within low-income households and neighborhoods to diasporic communities and state institutions. It will be of interest to scholars and students of medical/psychiatric anthropology, global health, and history of medicine, as well as South Asian and Pakistan studies.

The book explores the interrelation between carceral conditions and substance use by considering the intersections between drug markets, sidewalks, households, and prisons in Baltimore. Sanaullah Khan argues that while housing, medicalization, and incarceration fundamentally create the conditions for substance use, individuals are increasingly experiencing the paradoxes of care and punishment by being propelled into a new regime of recovery which creates new pharmaceuticalized identities. By shedding light on how addiction and the impetus for healing moves through families and institutions of the state, Khan provides an account of the different competing forces that shape substance use, recovery, and relapse. Through a combination of archival research and ethnography, the book makes a case for disentangling punishment from recovery.

Care, punishment, and recovery have become deeply entangled in contemporary responses to addiction.Sanaullah Khan examines the interrelation between carceral conditions and substance use by tracing how drug markets, sidewalks, households, and prisons intersect in Baltimore. Khan argues that housing policy, medicalization, and incarceration fundamentally shape the conditions of substance use, even as individuals are increasingly drawn into a paradoxical regime that combines care and punishment through recovery-oriented interventions. This regime produces new pharmaceuticalized identities while often reproducing the very vulnerabilities it claims to address. By illuminating how addiction, care, and the drive for healing circulate through families and state institutions, Khan reveals the competing forces that structure substance use, recovery, and relapse. Drawing on archival research and ethnography, the book ultimately makes a compelling case for disentangling recovery from punishment—showing why meaningful care requires rethinking the carceral logics that continue to govern drug and addiction policies.