And You Fall Down by Ann Fadiman is a very interesting book. It’s amazing how difficult it is for Americans to understand other cultures because the United States is such a diverse country. However, as an American, I understood the frustrations that Lia Lee’s doctors’ felt when trying to diagnose and treat her properly. In this book both the American doctors and the Hmong peoples faced many hardships and barriers when trying to communicate with each other. After having read this book I can understand
The book, Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, is a true story narrative on the life of Lia Lee. Lia Lee was a child who was born in the 1980s in Merced, California. She was a Hmong child who was epileptic. Epilepsy is a brain disorder in which a person has repeated seizures (convulsions) over time. Seizures are episodes of disturbed brain activity that cause changes in attention or behavior. Lia suffered from severe grand mal seizures since the age of three months. When the first seizure occurred
Tradition is defined in the dictionary as the handing down from generation to generation of the same customs and beliefs. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, I believe has two main topics addressed: the traditions of the Hmong people, and the dangers of being unable to communicate. The misunderstanding of these two consequential points, I believe caused the majority of conflict that arose. Can tradition prevent open-mindedness? Lia's parents reasoning of her seizures as "not so much a medical
traditional Hmong live a horticultural society they depend on domesticated plants, they are well-adapted on soils of the tropical rain forests and poor soil places which are unsuitable for intense agriculture. Prehistoric Hmong are thought to have moved from Eurasia and made a few stops at Siberia. As their custom they settled in the highlands (mountains) from Vietnam and Laos and later in Thailand. They inherited the name “Miao”, from living in the mountains. Today Five million Hmong reside in China
catches you and you fall down” In the novel, “The spirit catches you and you fall down”, Anne Fadiman was brilliantly able to capture how communication between other cultures takes place in the medical community. She writes about the experience of a Hmong family, the Lee’s, to portray the dissimilarities between two distinct cultures, Hmong and American. Throughout the novel she takes us on a rollercoaster of a journey as problems arise due to many barriers that naturally occur when collaborating two
At the time of time of birth, she was declared as a healthy child but at the age of three it was founded that she is suffering from epilepsy. In the words of western or scientific world the term epilepsy mean mental disorder of a person and in Hmong culture, epilepsy is referred to as qaug dab peg (translated in English, "the spirit catches you and you fall down"), in which epileptic attacks are perceived as evidence of the epileptic's ability to enter and journey momentarily into the spirit realm
California, which was home to the largest population of Hmong refugees, such as the Lee family, from Laos who suffered mass confusion when trying to navigate the American health care system. Because the Hmong could not speak sufficient English until the children gained language skills native to the United States, residents of California were not accepting of the Hmong community. Fadiman aims to better understand how knowledge of illness among Hmong and Western medical practitioners differ, which pushes
Some of the Hmong beliefs are they prefer traditional medicine, are culturally active, host ritual ceremonies, and are spirituality influenced. In the book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, refers to the Hmong culture and their beliefs on medicine while their baby Lia Lee, is suffering from epilepsy in which they have a hard decision. Traditional Hmong’s have their own medicinal beliefs which they obey prior to obtaining Western medicine. The gulf between Western medicine and Hmong health beliefs
let go of it. Kao Kalia Yang wrote the book The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir, which tells of the anguish the Hmong people faced in their excursion from Laos to the United States. Yang uses her unique writing style to present her topic in an enlightening way to her readers. Yang uses the story of her parents to convey the sufferings of the Hmong people and their journey. Her parents make a fitting example of a typical Hmong family fighting to survive and find love in a time of turmoil. Although
The book narrates about the conflict between modern medicine and the ancient beliefs amongst Hmong culture.The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down is a book written about the life of Lia Lee. Lia is a Hmong child living with epilepsy in America. Her devastating story shows the risks and dangers of cross-cultural communication in the medical field. The book details an account of the fight over the body and soul of this sick girl. The author provides unbiased and balanced view of what happened,
The Hmong people, an Asian ethnic group from the mountainous regions of China, Vietnam and Laos, greatly value their culture and traditions. The film “The Split Horn: Life of a Hmong Shaman in America” documents the seventeen year journey of the Hmong Shaman, Paja Thao and his family from the mountains of Laos to the heartland of America. This film shows the struggle of Paja Thao to maintain their 5000 year-old shamanic traditions as his children embrace the American culture. Moreover, the film shows
Begin? A Hmong American Literary Anthology” uses poems and short stories to show real experiences from Hmong-American writers, who survived through war, persecution, and exile. Endings”, by May Lee Yang, “In the End” and The last drops” by Soul Choj Vang, follow different types of endings, as one emphasizes the importance of endings in language, while the other expresses the ending of Hmong tradition. Through the literal sense in poems, endings
the healthcare settings to improve the way healthcare professionals communicate. (Kohn, 2000.) As part of my Culture, Health and Illness class, I undertook a critical analysis of the book “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures” by Anne Fadiman. This book was published in 1997, and documents the struggle of a Hmong family from Laos in communicating with and understanding the American health system. The Vietnam War caused great
You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman is about the cross-cultural ethics in medicine. The book is about a small Hmong child named Lia Lee, who had epilepsy. Epilepsy is called, quag dab peg1 in the Hmong culture that translates to the spirit catches you and you fall down. In the Hmong culture this illness is sign of distinction and divinity, because most Hmong epileptics become shaman, or as the Hmong call them, txiv neeb2. These shamans are special people imbued with healing spirits, and are held to those
Veteran, whose memories from the war continue to haunt him. His values, and beliefs lead him to pass judgment upon others that he encounters. He doesn’t seem to get along with anyone in his decaying Detroit neighborhood but an unlikely bond with his Hmong neighbors lead him to redemption, coming face-to-face with the same catastrophic bias’s consuming the community gang members that have consumed him. In the beginning of the movie Walt is attending his wife Dorothy’s funeral. He finds himself bombarded
Growing up with traditional Hmong parents, I was taught to not ask questions because it could offend others. Since then, I’ve already kept things to myself, even when I was curious about others I would often hope that someone else would as the questions I wanted to ask. As a social
Ladera, Krizette PSY43 Psychological Assessment 2 The Soul Keeper is about the biopic of Sabina Spielrein. In the present days, Maria Spielrein and Fraser are in Russia making a research about the life of Sabina Spielrein. In the beginning of the Twentieth Century, In 1904 Zurich, 19-year-old Sabina (Emilia Fox) is brought to Jung (Iain Glen) by her well-to-do Jewish family. She is deep into a violent, suicidal depression when Jung proposes they try something new. Instead of the usual chains
The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures (Fadiman, 1997) is an ethnography based on the story of Lia Lee. Lia was born to Hmong immigrant parents in Merced, California in 1982. The story is recounted in the Lee family and their collaborations with the medicinal group in Merced being taken care of by Lia, who develops an epileptic seizure at around 3 months of age. Dialect hindrances and conviction framework differences
movie Gran Torino from 2008 stars Clint Eastwood as a Walt Kowalski, a Korean War veteran. The film starts at his wife’s funeral and when he goes back home, he notices his neighbors, who are Hmong. Walt’s displeasure with them is clear as he spits when he sees the grandmother of the family. That night, the Hmong boy Thao tries to steal his Gran Torino as an initiation to join his cousin’s gang. His attempt is fruitless and caught by Walt. Thao then tries to avoid joining the gang, but they come back
This is a culture aspect for the Hmong. Walt realizes that the neighborhood looks bad. This is when classism is displayed. Thao works for Walt to improve the class of the neighborhood. Thao starts to fix the gutters of the house across the street. He also paints the house and