Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates - Erving Goffman

Erving Goffman examines life inside institutions such as psychiatric hospitals, prisons, military establishments and monasteries, exploring how institutional routines and rules shape the people confined within them. Drawing on fieldwork at St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington, D.C., Goffman develops the concept of the “total institution”, where many aspects of daily life are controlled by a single authority. He investigates how inmates adapt to institutional demands, how personal identity is challenged or reshaped, and how people find ways to preserve a sense of self. A landmark work in sociology and the study of psychiatric institutions.