In the ever-evolving landscape of medicine, one principle stands as a cornerstone for delivering equitable and effective healthcare: cultural humility. Cultural humility entails a commitment to understanding and respecting the diverse cultural backgrounds of our patients, thereby enhancing the quality of care we provide.

Despite strides in promoting cultural competency within medical education, disparities persist, hindering the delivery of culturally appropriate healthcare. The lack of nuanced training particularly affects patients whose cultural perspectives are underrepresented in curricula.

The year 2020 challenged and changed all of us: the COVID19 pandemic combined with political turmoil… truly, every American can see that our way of life is evolving under volatile conditions. Lack of reform contributes to an almost daily wave of gun violence. Criminal justice is tasked with implementing overdue corrections to institutional racism but is pushed to do so because of public outrage. Fears vs COVID, vaccinations, masks, mask wearers, mask-refusers – how did so many Americans lose faith in public health? Distractions are everywhere.

Social Psychiatry is a paradigm that combines medical training with the perspectives of social anthropology, social psychology, cultural psychiatry, sociology and other disciplines relating to the human condition and to mental distress and disorder. The discipline of Social Psychiatry emerged in the 20th Century placing its main focus on the person’s social milieu and economic circumstances.

It seems too often truth has been stood on its head in our recent American culture. Truth has gotten stretched, twisted, and waved like a banner by all sides of a divided and intolerant discourse.

There is nothing new about the dance, though; only the lyrics are different. A push to free up and change is met by a pushback to maintain the status quo. Even the violence that ensues is not new, although it feels more chaotic...

Welcome to the new website of the American Association for Social Psychiatry!

It is only appropriate that American Social Psychiatry should be fully engaged in social media--in the future, look for a Facebook page or Twitter account, too. It is our intent to inject increased dynamism into American Social Psychiatry- and into AASP.